Introducing the first of our two part DIY Raffia Lamp series – a couple of ideas you can use independently or together to give new life to a forgotten table lamp. It’s no secret that we love natural textures so for this creation we focused on a tactile whitewash finish for the base and feature raffia wrapped lampshade, which we will show you how to create today.
Overall the process of the lampshade took a few hours, making it perfect for a Sunday ‘crafternoon’. Being quite a repetitive process we invite you to light a candle, listen to your favourite soothing soundtrack and sink into a meditative state as you get lost in the art of making.
You will need:
Lamp shade
Raffia
Hot glue gun
Plenty of hot glue refills
Scissors
Step 1
Ensure that your shade is free of dust. Prepare by warming your hot glue gun and separating your raffia strands. Start at the bottom inner rim of your shade, apply a dot of hot glue to the inside of the rim.
Step 2
While the glue is still hot, press the end of a raffia strand into position. Repeat by gluing a few more strands side by side.
Turn the shade the right way up, and gently pull the raffia strands up and over the top of the shade’s upper rim. Glue them in place on the inside of the shade. It’s important to work from bottom to top with sloped shades as this will ensure that the raffia is straight. Ensure that you work quickly with this step, whilst the glue is still hot. The more glue you use – the messier the end product can be.
Step 3
Cut the ends of the raffia on the inside of the shade as you go so that they are the same length. This will give you a neater finish in the end.
The rest basically involves repeating this process around the entire rim. Once you get the hang of it, we found ourselves working in 5cm sections then going back over the top of that section to apply more raffia strands to cover the gaps.
Please note: as we used hot glue to apply the raffia be mindful of using your lamp for many hours at a time or lamps that emit a lot of heat as this may loosen the glue. If you are wary of this you can apply a neat strip of brown kraft tape around the inside rims to further secure the raffia.
Please note: as we used hot glue to apply the raffia be mindful of using your lamp for many hours at a time or lamps that emit a lot of heat as this may loosen the glue. If you are wary of this you can apply a neat strip of brown kraft tape around the inside rims to further secure the raffia.
Stay tuned for our next post where we will show you how to create the whitewashed lamp base.
