How to Make Your Own Chandelier Shades From Scratch Without a Frame

Make flower shades without frames. Select enough large, colorful fabric flowers with wired rims to replace your current shades. Wrap each flower around the bottom of a bowl-shaped drinking glass so it contours to the shape. Apply a fabric fixative product to each bloom to freeze the shape. Allow the flowers to dry and harden. Cut a hole into each flower’s center that’s large enough to fit over chandelier branches. Face up or face down, these flower shades are cute enough to repeat as wall decor, so make extras.

Save a bundle by making faux tin chandelier shades from aluminum stove burner bibs that are sure to reflect fanciful shapes when bulbs and metal meet. Trim burner bib edges with a decorative cutting tool: Pinking shears, scrapbook scissors or a tin cutter all work, as long as you wind up with nicely finished edges. Tent the aluminum to contour the shade and then slide each over a chandelier branch. Use pliers to crimp the aluminum to each branch for a tight fit. Make it permanent by fusing the metal to the branch with a soldering gun and solder.

Turn little wicker baskets that are small enough to hold a cup of water into frameless chandelier shades as long as they’re shapely enough to do the job. Choose baskets with a fairly loose weave so rays of light can peek through the wicker. Cut holes into the bottom of the mini-baskets. Bind the edges with ribbon and a glue gun or use a decorative crafting tape to hide the cut line. Thread each basket over a branch so it floats over a chandelier bulb. If your room features Tuscan, French Country or other provincial-style decor, this rustic chandelier, with its frameless basket shades, adds a touch of romance.

Make frameless chandelier shades from eclectic materials: Clear glass ornaments used on Christmas trees can be repurposed as shades. Refashion baby food jars, decorated with glass paints and turned opening side down, into frameless chandelier shades that pay tribute to the recycling movement. Turn glass bells into calla lily shades by hanging them, bell shape down, over light bulbs after painting the edges with white glass paint. Take fun risks. Follow the lead of one innovative lamp designer who wrapped a hanging lamp with sunglasses. Remember that if you can bend it and the size is right, your found object may be the key to a remarkable lighting fixture with not a conventional framed shade in sight.