Giving New Life to an Old Light Fixture

Sometimes I get the wildest ideas.

I don't know how it came about, but I decided I wanted to change the light fixture in my dining room.  I have never been a real big fan of gold fixtures, and after pricing new fixtures, I wanted to try my hand at something risky...yet something fun.

I was going to re-do my existing light fixture!  Not only would it be much cheaper, but it would also guarantee a perfect fit back into the ceiling.  I would simply use the same mounting kit!

 

My original dining room light is original to the home, I assume.  It's a fairly ugly (to me) gold fixture complete with a brown and black center piece of wood.  Seriously, I hate it!  It's hideous.

The original beast in all her (un)glory.

This just screams 1980 to me.

After doing some research on colors and products, I elected to go with Rustoleum's spray paint.  I bought a single bottle from Wal-Mart for $6.87.  Agh, if this didn't work, I was going to be mad!!!  I hate wasting money.  :)

Once back at home, I had to figure out how I was going to set this project up.  Mom and Dad were in Cleveland visiting, so they were able to watch me in my finest!  ha!  I took the fixture down and decided to prop it up outside where I could spraypaint it.  I simply hung it on a rake between two birdhouse posts.  Works for me!

I taped up the electrical wires after unweaving them through the mountain chain (which would also be painted).  I then took toilet paper rolls from the trash and mounted those over the five ceramic bulb housings.  I was pretty proud of that move.

Ready for paint!

And then I started painting!!!  I have a little bit of experience with spraypainting over the years, and if there is anything I've learned, it's that patience is key.  If you think you need one more spray path, then stop.  Wait.  Let it dry.  For the moment you get just a hair too much on there, the paint starts to run.  It's all about being patient.

So that's what I did.  Little by little.  I had a tiny 5 MPH wind to deal with, but that was enough to blow it back at me!  And it kept on shifting!  But the project was going very smoothly.  The light fixture was transforming before our very eyes!

She's transformed!

I had sanded the ceiling cover to get the decent amount of rust off of it, then spraypainted that over an old potato chip bag.  Hey, whatever is lyin' around is fair game.  :)

The old rusty cover now looked glossy and new!

After several passes of paint, I was done!!!  Mom had cleaned up the dusty and dirty glass covers, and so we assembled the light fixture back together.  I hung it in my dining room, and oh what a difference!  It's the SAME light!!! But it's nowhere close to the same light!!!

The gorgeous "new" light fixture!  Only $7!

 

No more gold!

Good-bye old glass!  Hello modern light!

This is pretty fun.  And $7 beats $100 any day.

Let There Be Light!!!

I've said it once, and I'll say it again...

Sometimes it's the smallest of details.

Well, I have had a light in the hallway that is used nearly every day.  It's right inside the door when I walk in, and it's needed once the sun sets to navigate the numerous stairs.  There's only one problem...

It's from 1939.

The old light fixture.

I never really minded it, but now that the area is painted, I just wanted to continue to update that area some more.

So a quick little trip to Lowe's did the trick.  I bought a contemporary light fixture for a whopping $11, and I decided to learn a little electrical know-how (I called Dad!).

The fixture was kind of interesting.  The glass outer covering was actually attached TO THE LIGHTBULB!!!  It just used a spring-like device to clamp on to the glass.  Dad said this was pretty common in the past.  How about that!

After removing the light fixture, I was shocked at two things...

#1--One of the previous colors of this room was turquoise!!!  It had sent been painted a dull yellow (I changed that a while back), but what a bright color this area had been.

#2--Men used to stand by their work.  Inside the light fixture with the wires, I found a stamp-sized paper that had the union that did the labor along with the foreman's signature.  I'm sure he is dead by now.  But could you imagine if every work that was done had a proud man standing behind it?!  "If it fails, call me!  I'll fix it!"

It brought up the memories of Dad always telling me, "Andy, my name is on this."  He used to say that all the time during electrical projects that I would tag along on.  He would often find some shoddy (his word) electrical work that wasn't done properly.  This would only be known after opening up a wall or crawling through an attic or crawlspace.  For the work that he was hired (or asked) to do, he would bring it up to code and do the project right.  It was often more difficult, but that always stuck with me.

The old light fixture...and color of ceiling!

But what a neat little piece of history.  That tiny little paper was now 83 years old.  (He must have done good work!).

After a little bit of effort, I had a brand-new light.

Before...(notice the old yellow walls, too!  It's an older picture...)

After!  $11 for a simple update!

It was nothing fancy.  But what a difference it makes!  It looks better, and I tell you, this area is sooooooo much brighter!  It has two bulbs instead of one, and I was able to use the CFL bulbs, too.  It's a huge change.

Oh, Those Ugly Stairs!!!

One of the biggest updates on my to-do list was my basement.  I included the whole basement in there as EVERYTHING needed updating.  The stairs, the walls, the floors.  My main bathroom was priority #1 in the home, but now that that project is complete, I could focus my attention on the basement.

The dark, dungy basement!  Certainly not too appealing a place!

It's such a great room of the house but has no appeal!!!

I first started with the stairs.  I had researched numerous before-and-after pictures of others re-doing their stairs, and I concluded that I liked hardwood floors.  But I had a mess to get through to get to the original wood.  Let me see if I can describe this in full.  My basement stairs had a soft, red protective cover that was held down by metal on the edges.  Below this cover was a coat of black paint that was painted over brown paint.  The red mats appear to have replaced previous mats, or else the owner simply painted around the red mats, as some exposed wood was beneath the red mats.

The stairs after removing the red pads as seen on the basement floor.

Certainly sturdy but just not much to look at!

Needless to say, I had my work cut out for me.  I tried paint remover, but that was quickly becoming a mess.  A very dirty mess.  I tried sanding, but I didn't like that method, either...my sander simply wasn't penetrating the two layers of paint.

So before I could even start the project, I did an about-face and went an entirely new direction!  Instead of bringing back the original hardwood which was appearing very elusive, I decided to just repaint the stairs in their entirety!

I first started with the vertical wood which I chose to paint white.

Painting the stairs...

It's lookin' great!

I then pulled out my $1 paint from Wal-Mart and started painting the horizontal pieces.  I had debated going with a black-and-white theme, but the more pictures I found, the more I realized that my home didn't quite match up with such fancy stairs.  I am happy with the colors I chose...the results are simply night and day.

Now painting the horizontal portion with my cheap $1 paint!  :)

I am beyond thrilled with the results!!!

I opted to keep the iron railing off of the new stairs.  I feel like the piece is from 1960 and doesn't match the new look I am going for.  I LOVE the new stairs.  It's amazing what a little work can do.  :)  Now that the stairs are fixed, I am forced to continue updating the rest of the basement!!!  Oh, what work this is going to be!!!  But what a GREAT start!