Thursday, December 30, 2010

Kitchen Lamp

I already showed you a picture of my awesome hunk of wood (soon to be kitchen lamp):
Our first step was to find parts to turn it into a lamp. You can buy lamp kits at hardware and home improvement stores. Of course, I had to be picky. My countertop space beneath my kitchen cabinets is only 18" tall.  The pièce de résistance (hunk of wood) is 5.5" tall. The only lamp shade that looks right is a 10"x10" square. That doesn't leave much room for the little pole thingy (pretty technical, huh?) that needs to hold the lightbulb.  We had to find the pieces below:

 So we went to this place:
 It is called Royal Touch. I can't find a website to give you. Of course, after going there it doesn't surprise me. It is pretty incredible though. The walls are just lined with every kind of lamp or light fixture part you can imagine. Here is the info I can give you:15615 Coit Rd., Suite 210, Dallas, TX 75248 (972) 386-9189 (972) 386-6942 (Fax)
$20 bought us all the supplies we needed to turn this baby into a lamp. It is the same price as any lamp kit. Unfortunately, I wanted a brushed nickel look to all my pieces and they only carried brass and chrome parts. We threw a little spray paint on them and we're all set!

2 comments:

  1. I can't wait to see this!!!!!!!!

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  2. To drill the wood block, the key is to center the hole, then drill perpendicular to the base, so that the lamp kit tube remains perfectly vertical. This was done using a drill guide and a wood boring bit, just slightly larger diameter than the lamp kit tube. The reason you don't want the hole drilled too much larger is that it must be kept perpendicular to the base of the wood block... too much larger than the tube, and the lamp kit assembly might get loose and angle away from vertical, making the lamp look more like the leaning tower of Pisa...

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