Another One Bites the Dust: Stairway Lighting

We're at it again, y'all.  And this time we've migrated upstairs. This builder grade lighting replacement journey is finally reaching its end in our house.  (You can check out my earlier posts about my knock-off rope chandelier, $10 industrial pendant lights, and mason jar vanity light.)

This time, I let a lucky Goodwill find do the dirty work for me.  Well, that and a strapping hubby, an awesome daddy, and one ginormous ladder to get the job done.  

We definitely don't have our act together in this space yet.  Here's what we've had going on in our stairway since we moved in.

It's very...vanilla.  Not even that really.  Even vanilla has flavor.  This is like paper flavored.  Blah.

I'd even be okay with this pendant light if it looked like most builder grade fixtures I've seen, but this one I despised.  It looked alien.  And kind of like an image I remember being exposed to way back in 6th grade during a really awkward sex-ed class.  (Right?!  Do you see it now?  Ew!!!  Just when you thought the dreaded boob light couldn't be any worse, this guy showed up to the scene.)

Thank goodness, I found the perfect replacement at Goodwill last week that only set me back $17!

I'm always a bit leary of buying lights in thrift stores because I have ended up with a dud before that I later discovered had wiring issues and didn't work.  But I took my chances with this one.  It was still in the original packaging and everything.

I looked up the item number online and found it for sale for $147! 

Over 88% off?!  Sha-weet!

We took a break from our master bathroom makeover progress while my dad brought over his really cool ladder.  That massive thing could position on our stairs to reach the high ceiling and finally take down the light fixture that I had been giving the evil eye for way too long.

Oh so much better.  

Now if only we had some paint on those primer white walls.  Hmm...

We'll get there eventually.  But this was already a big improvement.

We've spent $173 total on 10 light fixtures in our house.  That's pretty fantabulous.  

A little heads up, I'll be back tomorrow with a big giveaway!  It's been too long since I gave back to you guys for following me along this house journey of ours, so it was way overdue.  

If you liked this post, be sure to check out this one:

5 Industrial DIY Light Fixtures for Under $20

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DIY Industrial Pendant Light for Under $10

Happy Monday, friends!  I have about three projects going on at once today.  I've hit total beast mode to knock out several things that have just been sitting and waiting on me to finish.  You'll see a couple of them later this week.

I realized it's been a while since I posted a builder grade light re-do.  If you are new to following my DIY insanity, I've made it my mission to personalize every builder grade basic light fixture in our house...at least the downstairs for now.  

My style isn't for everyone, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with simple lighting.  But for our home, the hubby and I wanted something with more interest, and the one I'm sharing with y'all today is definitely not your average cookie-cutter suburban light fixture.  I know there are other bloggers out there who have shared their versions of industrial style lights, so it's nothing new under the sun.  But I'm stoked to have one for myself!

I have a mixture of styles that I love- farmhouse, French country, industrial- and I try to keep them balanced and working together in our space.  (Do you find yourself in that struggle too? I blame Pinterest.)

 Since I had most of the materials I needed already hanging out in our garage and four light fixtures still left to makeover in our kitchen, I decided to go for it with our bar pendant lights.  And this one was super easy!

If you want to try it out for yourself, here are the materials I used:

• Builder grade mini pendant light fixture
• Oil rubbed bronze spray paint (affiliate)
• Sisal rope- 3/8 inch
• High temp hot glue gun and glue sticks
• Metal lamp guard (affiliate)

Since I had two fixtures, the total ended up being just under $10 for each light.

Here's what we were dealing with before.  Nice, simple, but just not us.

I had a can of leftover (and my favorite) Rustoleum Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint and primer.  So I taped off the electrical parts on the fixtures and sprayed two coats.

Even though I planned to wrap them in rope, I went ahead and sprayed the rods too just in case any peeked through.

I let the light fixtures dry for a full 24 hours before the next step.  

Then, using high temp hot glue, I wrapped the sisal rope tightly around the downrods of the pendant lights.  It was tedious but worth it!  

Each light took about 30-40 minutes to wrap.  The beginning is a little tricky to get started.  Hold the rope in place for the first few wraps around the downrod, and apply about a dime size of hot glue for each wrap around.

I held the end in place until the last bit of glue was completely cool.

The lamp guards screwed right in place above the bulb and that was it!  I used Edison bulbs to give it a more vintage look too.  They give off a yellowy light that I'm okay with in person, but it doesn't translate very well to photos.  They are rustic industrial fabulosity though. :)

And they remind me a lot of Restoration Hardware's version but without the $119 price tag.

They look pretty darn smashing with our giant chalkboard and vintage gallery wall...

...and our breakfast nook's clock wall too.

Tomorrow, I'll be sharing a knock-your-socks-off fall recipe.  If you follow me on Instagram, you might have already seen a sneak peek of the epic main ingedient. ;)  I just pulled it out of the oven and oh...my..heavens.

If you liked this post, check out these other light fixture DIYs too.  (Just click the image to find the project details.)

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