DIY Lamp : How We Turned a Vase into a Lamp

Lamps and lampshades are hands down one of my favorite things to invest in… they add so much to any space and a quality heirloom lamp can do so much for a room! But, of course, with any heirloom quality piece, comes a higher price. I fell in love with this lamp when I saw a few designers share it at Round Top earlier this year. Coincidentally, I realized this vase I own looks pretty identical to the base of that lamp!

So, I did a little bit of research and told Justin I wanted to make a lamp!

What I Ordered

Since I already owned the vase, I purchased this lamp kit, a wooden vase cap, and a brass turn knob.

Step 01

Determine what side of the vase you want to be the front of your lamp.

Step 02

Drill a hole in the backside of the vase using a drill and bit for the lamp cord to go through.

Step 03

Follow the instructions that come with the lamp kit and wire everything together- Justin said this part was pretty straight forward and simple.

We measured the opening of our vase and went with a 4.5″ wide vase cap. I stained it using English Chestnut and Dark Walnut.

Step 04

If the mouth of your vase is uneven, meaning the vase cap doesn’t sit flush against the opening, depending on the material (ours is terra cotta), you may need to sand it a bit. We sanded parts of ours down a bit so this cap sat as even as possible. Once we were happy with it, we attached it to the top of the vase opening with silicone.

Step 05

I screwed the brass turn key on, added a bulb, plugged it in and voila!

Here’s how it turned out! I couldn’t be more happy with it! Such an easy and rewarding project!

The only thing I wasn’t crazy about was the lampshade- I borrowed it from another lamp I already owned and while it’s a beautiful linen shade, I don’t love how there is no contrast from the shade and our curtains behind it.