Miniature Vintage Lamp Tutorial

 Hello!  These lovely little faux vintage lamps are simple to make and look stunning and real in your miniature setting or dollhouse.  Just a side note before we begin to plug my Etsy shop... I  do sell these from time to time in my shop if you don't want to go through the trouble of making your own.  

They are made from plastic paint trays from Dollar Tree that come in a set of three (I think).  Other materials include a pre-made spindle for dollhouse furniture or stairs, jewelry findings, sewing pins, paint and glue.

HA!!  Below is a real example of my skills.. lol.  Don't know what I was doing with the edit to get the red marks.  LOL

I pre-poked holes into the center of the spindle on top and bottom to make with the pin to make it a little easier to insert.

Below shows the pin stuck up through the jewelry piece into the spindle.  You will want to apply glue to fix these permanently.

For the base coat I used a drop of paint mixed with a drop of clear drying glue and a tad of water.

Paint flowers using a few colors mixed on your tiny brush and apply using swooshes or paint in a circle.  Then paint leaves and branches if you wish.

I used chains from old earrings for the light pull.  Snip a pin and put it through the piece of chain then stick the pin into the side of the spindle for the chain pull look.  Cut your chain to the proper length.

I also painted the spindles.

Lastly, you will need to cut out your lamp shade and poke a hole in the center of the lamp shade, put a pin through a smaller jewelry finding and stick (with glue) into the top of the spindle.

Miniature Faux Stained Glass Lantern Tutorial

Morning!  So I began, and have since finished, my vintage radio repurpose project.  This post shows the lantern that I made from card stock, plastic, washable markers, string and scrap chain along with a light kit from Model Train Software.

I initially browsed the internet for inspiration for my lantern and came up with this picture on Google.  I really liked it and it seemed do-able so I tried my hand at it... miniature sized.  Seems easy enough right?!?!

I cut out trapezoids from black card stock and cut out the center where my "stained glass" panels would go.  Then cut out pieces from plastic packaging from a Swiffer refill pack.  I drew the design with a fine tip Sharpie marker.  I then colored the areas in, one at a time, and used Mod Podge over each colored layer to fill it in.  The washable marker smears when the glue goes on like old stained glass and sometimes even bubbles up.  I let the glue dry between coats.  Usually I use several coats on stained glass but these only took one or two.

I cut the "glass" down to fit each panel and glued the in with my favorite wood glue.  For some reason the plastic doesn't stick very well so I used my Mod Podge on top of the edges of plastic when they dried.  I have had to go back and glue thin strips of paper to help them adhere better.

I cut long thin strips of card stock and sprayed several coats of fabric starch letting the dry in between.  This seems to have helped the pieces hold their shape when I started curling them.  I used a toothpick to curl the "wrought iron" pieces.

I made smaller curly pieces and glued them together while also gluing the light panels together.  At this point there was only hope that this would all come together.

This step was a bit unexpected.  I hadn't imagined how the lamp was to hang at this point but when I held my light in once the panels were all glued together I had some gaps between the panels.  I dug out some trusty DMC floss (used for cross stitch) and glued pieces inside all of the panel folds or where they come together.  The long pieces coming out of the top just seemed to form the base of my hanging straps so I used a piece of rolled up card stock (tube shaped left from my tea kettle tutorial) and glued the strings to it.  That way my electric wires had something to go through for hanging.

I then began to glue on my curly pieces from the outside of the lantern to the card stock tube that the strings are glued to.  It's getting pretty fancy at this point.

I didn't take pictures of the placing of the light inside or my threading it through the pieces of chain and through a half bead.  I guess it took two hands.  But once that was done I poked a hole in a piece of card stock and glued the wires on the top side of it.  This is the piece that will be mounted on the ceiling that you won't notice because you are staring at the beautiful lamp... right?!?! :)

And here is the chain and half "bead".

I had extra curlies so I glued some to a small card stock tube left over and glued it to the bottom of the lantern.  I think it needed it.

And this is the finished lantern hung inside the radio.

I love how the colors of the panels really show through the light onto the inside of the radio.

And Taa-Daa!  Finished light.  If you look to closely you can see every imperfection and it looks sloppy but that's the beauty of it.  Because when you back up and look at the entire finished project the imperfections disappear.