So I recently hit the 1 year mark with my boyfriend so I wanted to make him something that he could use and we could keep around and always remember it was from our first year together. His favorite liquor is Jameson, and I had an empty bottle sitting on my countertop for months and I kept thinking it would be cool if I could do something Jameson-related for him. Then, about a week ago it hit me - that bottle would make an awesome lamp!
So, I ordered a Diamond Drill Bit from Amazon to drill a hole in the glass, purchased a bottle-to-lamp kit from Home Depot and went in search of a lampshade to match the bottle.
Unfortunately, I didn't find the lampshade, and the bottle-to-lamp kit didn't have a rubber stopper that would fit the mouth of the Jameson bottle so I had to be a little creative to get the look I wanted. I ended up painting a white lampshade black with a little thinned out acrylic paint, I would basically paint a coat over a 1-2 inch section, then use a dry paper towel to rub away excess paint. This kept it from feeling plastic-y when it was done and allowed the paint to be thick enough to be black,but not so thick as to keep light from coming through the shade completely.
I used the diamond bit to drill a 16mm hole in the bottom of the bottle about an inch from the bottom. It was pretty easy really, and I had seen a neat trick on a youtube video to use plumbers putty to keep the bit dry while you drilled (
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaAguZdPMzM) It worked like a charm!
The lamp kit was interesting. I ended up shaving the largest rubber stopper down until it would fit into the bottle, and when I assembled the lamp, I pushed it far enough down into the bottle that the cap would go back onto the bottle. I also chose to thread the wire up through the center of the stopper and threaded piece so that it would exit the drilled hole I made before. The rest of the hookup went right along with the directions on the bottle, except instead of the lamp piece being up against the brass cap that came with the lamp kit, it was up against the lid of the bottle.
I'm really happy with how it turned out!
(Sorry for the long winded explanation)
The finished product! He loved it
The hole that I drilled through the bottle. You can see it splintered a little bit on the inside, but I think if I had been a little slower with the drilling that wouldn't have happened. You can hardly notice it when the lamp is on the nightstand though.
The lamp with the bottle cap still on it. I regret not taking a picture of the rubber stopper, but it's completely hidden by the metal on the bottle.
Links to what I used in case someone else wanted to make one:
Diamond Drill Bit
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00899COJY/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00Bottle-to-lamp kit from Home Depot
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-100192701/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=make+a+lamp&storeId=10051#.UJc_zRimBpE Plumbers Putty
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202312407/h_d2/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10053&langId=-1&keyword=plumbers+putty&storeId=10051#.UJdAZBimBpE
