DIY Drum Shade {Tutorial}

Thank you for all of your kind comments on my dark ceiling!  Yesterday I gave you a sneak peek of my new drum shade, and today I'll show you how I did it.

About 7-8 years ago I purchased this vintage chandelier at a thrift store.  It was a little more pricey than I would normally pay, but all of the crystals were there and I knew this wasn't something I would come across often, so I snatched it up.  In our old house it hung in our kitchen eating area, and when we moved to our current home I hung it in the office to add a bit of glam.  I always felt like it was a little small for the space, but loved it too much to replace it.  

A few weeks ago, after seeing a few photos on Pinterest, inspiration struck!  I didn't even try to find a pre-made drum shade that would fit my chandy.  I still wanted to be able to see the fixture, but wanted to bulk it up a bit.  

I have a ton of pictures today, so I'll get on with it!

Supplies: 

 (2) 23" embroidery hoops-I only used the interior solid rim from each one

18 gauge wire

gold tulle (2-3 yards)

Not pictured: 

wooden skewers

gold trim ribbon

clothespins & hot glue gun (2 of my staple supplies for projects!)

I tightly wrapped the ends of each wire on 4 somewhat even sections of the hoop...just eyeballed it.

After looking at my chandelier, I determined that I wanted the height of the shade to be 10 inches, so while holding the top hoop at the right mark, I wired it together with the bottom hoop.

I thought that the wire would be enough support, and it did hold really well from top to bottom, but the hoops shifted too easily from side to side.  So, I clipped some wooden skewers to size and hot glued them in place near the wires.

I wanted to make sure that the glue would hold the skewers in place well, so I left the wire on and sprayed the entire thing gold.

Everything was holding up very nicely, so I clipped off the wires between the hoops, just leaving the skewers for support.  I wired 4 more pieces to the top hoop, planning to use them to secure the shade to the light.  And the frame was done!

Then, I started working to cover it.  I bought 5 yards of fabric not exactly sure how I was going to cover it, but here's what I came up with.  The tulle comes already folded in half lengthwise, and I left it that way.  Then, I folded about a 1/2" towards the inside of the top hoop, and wrapped the tulle lengthwise around the outside.  That still left a lot of fabric width at the bottom, which I pulled up through the middle inside and clipped to the top rim.  A little hard to explain, but basically I wrapped it so there were 4 thicknesses of the fabric around the shade, a double width on the outside wrapped with a double width on the inside.  Clear as mud??? 

After trimming the excess yardage, I worked to pull from the top and tighten everything up.  When it looked o.k., I clipped the top edge to hold everything in place.

Next, on the inside top rim, I used hot glue along the edge.  It soaked through all of the layers of tulle and when it cooled off all of the fabric was stuck in place and secure.  After removing the clothes pins I went back and glued those sections as well.  (What, you don't name your clothespins???  ;)  Back in my teaching days I used wooden clothespins each year for the lunch count and helper charts, and just kept them all to use at home after the year was over.  It's fun to look back at the names and remember the children.  I taught 3rd grade and most of my students are probably out of college now!)

After the glue dried I carefully trimmed the excess off of the top.

This is the seam.  The starting point is underneath and when I got to the end, I just folded it under and glued the top like the rest.  I tried to place it right at the skewer so it wouldn't be as noticeable.  It's not perfect, but that's o.k.  I hung that part in the back.

Rather than cutting a slit around the wire, I just left the fabric and pulled it a little tighter.  You can't really see it anyway once the shade was hung.

However, you COULD see the hot glue, so I used some gold ribbon trim to cover it.  I went around the inside top and bottom edges and I think it helped to give a finished look.

O.K.!  The shade was done and the moment of truth had come...figuring out if I was going to be able to hang it.  My plan was to just rig it with those 4 wires.  It weighs next to nothing, so that wasn't an issue.  Here's the top view.  The wires really aren't visible from ground level unless you stand really far back and look really hard.  I think it was beneficial to hang it this way, because I could adjust each wire as needed to get the shade to hang straight. (Which was probably the hardest part of the entire project!)

And there you go!

Here's the view from underneath.  Nothing touches the shade, so we should be all nice and safe. 

I love it!  The scale is just right for the room now and it feels updated although I can still see the pretty fixture and crystals underneath.

It gives off a really pretty glow at night, too!

Oh, and I almost forgot the best part.  I used coupons for the hoops at Hobby Lobby, and the tulle and ribbon were on sale.  So, the cost for this project was about $14!

You can see my Pinterest board here where I pinned some photos that gave me the idea for this project, and you can click on the button on my sidebar if you would like to follow me on Pinterest.  

Linking up with:
Savvy Southern Style
The Shabby Nest 
Tatertots & Jello
Classy Clutter
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