WOULD YOU LIKE TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE THESE LAMPSHADES?
WANT TO SAVE 10% OFF SUPPLIES?
Read on and I’ll tell you how you can WIN A BEGINNER DVD and where to SOURCE THE SUPPLIES.
A little over ten years ago I was trolling the acres of Brimfield, in Massachusetts looking for my usual diamonds in the rough. Think of Brimfield as endless farmland with countless antique estate sale finds, just begging to hop in your car to be taken home. I came across something unusual, though – beautifully hand-sewn lampshades. They weren’t grimy or tattered, but rather over-the-top AH-mazing! I purchased one from the artist selling them and over the following year, commissioned her to make several more for me.
Here’s a look at the shade that got me hooked:
I studied them closely and tried making my own. I got the hang of it, but I had a problem: other than stumbling across vintage-style wire frames at garage sales and other “picks” across the northeast, I didn’t know where to source the wire frames. Luckily for me, I came across Mary Maxwell and her website: Victorian Lampshade Supply.
Mary has been sewing truly beautiful victorian style lampshades for 38 years and has mastered her craft. Not only does she offer the wire frames for purchase on her website, she also carries the other materials needed for the lining, seams, fabric, trim, beads, and even the lamp bases themselves! But here is the BEST PART: she has created DVD’s to help you learn how to make these one-of-a-kind shades yourself!
Here are just **some** of the lampshades Mary has made. The frames are available for purchase on her website:
I am a sewer who likes to make garments for my baby girl and the occasional quilt. But LAMPSHADES? I can’t stop! If you come from a quilting background, making lampshades are perfect for BUSTING into all those FAT QUARTERS you’ve been hoarding:-) If you start small (with a boudoir style lamp shade), they really don’t require that much fabric. I **do** recommend always sewing the lining fabric in (as boring as it may get) because if you don’t, you are liable to see the lightbulb outline directly through your outer fabric. The lining truly makes the light more diffuse and stops from having an ugly lightbulb appearing through your darling outer fabric.
Here are some “before” and “after” shots of the shades I made over the last 3 weeks.
The larger shade took me about 2 weeks to sew together (a few hours each night after the kiddos went to bed and 2 weekend days). The smaller shade took me about 2 days (16 hours.) I would like to point out that this process would probably go a little faster if I wasn’t a stickler for sewing on the trim. As you will see in Mary’s DVD’s (if you get one) she uses glue for that part and it looks like it saves a lot of time 🙂
So, did I provide enough eye candy for you? Are you ready to get started sewing? I HEAR YOU!! Mary is so cool. She has graciously agreed to let readers of my blog save 10% off their purchase in her store now through March 1st 2015. All you have to do at the checkout is leave “WeatherKimShades” in the comments section of the checkout and she’ll apply it to your purchase (this excludes shipping.) I encourage you to check out this link HERE and HERE and consider purchasing one of Mary’s two beginner lampshade KITS & DVD combos. The kit/dvd combo is awesome because she provides everything you need to make the shade featured in that kit for one low price. Below are the 2 kit/beginner dvd combos available:
Additionally, she has a ton of wire frames, lining fabric, trim, seem binding and other materials to help you on your way. All is located in her online shop HERE.
To top it off, Mary has graciously agreed to give one lucky winner a FREE COPY of her beginner DVD🙂 !! Not to worry, though, if you go ahead and purchase the dvd and end up winning it. She said she’ll give the winner copies of her other 2 DVDs featuring advanced techniques should you have already purchased the beginner one 🙂
HOW TO WIN A COPY of “HOW TO MAKE VICTORIAN STYLE LAMPSHADES” dvd:
- Follow @weatherkim on Instagram (that’s me!)
- You must follow me on Instagram to win AND you must tag 2 friends on Instagram in the comments section of the picture of my Instagram feed featuring this give away.
That picture looks like this:
- Another way you can win is by following @WeatherKim on Instagram AND re-gramming my picture featuring the give-away with the hashtag #WeatherKimShadesGiveaway on your feed. You decide.
I’ll announce the winner on my Instagram feed sometime Monday evening February 9th. Until then, let your fingers do the walking right on over to Mary’s website and bust out that fabric stash – we’ve got some lampshades to make!
Ta-da!
It only took me 6 months, but I finally finished Eden’s quilt. I feel guilty because I made a quilt for another cutie-pie first (her baby shower was in December and I knew I wanted to make something.) For Eden’s quilt I wanted to create something with an Anthropologie vibe that was all-over kind of neutral with punches of color.
As I type, Eden just turned 6 months old. What you don’t know about that picture above is that I plopped her down like twenty times only to have her roll onto her side before I could safely let go and take the picture! You can imagine how happy I was to have her both upright AND smiling!
I spent the final month of my pregnancy painting Eden’s crib. I found a zero VOC paint at Lowes by Olympic Paint. The color is Calypso Berry and it was that color from which I picked out my fabrics to use in making the quilt. I used a lot of Art Gallery fabrics (seriously, I love LOVE LOVE them!), some Joel Dewberry, & the base is just a neutral Jo-Ann grab. The Art Gallery fabrics are from their Summer Love & Modernology collections by Pat Bravo (this has to be one of the nicest designers around – her videos make you want to jump into the screen with the crew and start dancing!) I hope to meet her at Spring Quilt Market in Portland OR in a few months. (And I am just DYING to meet Bari J! She is one of the newest members of the Art Gallery Team. I’ll be crafting with some of her LillyBelle fabric that I have stockpiled soon (waves to @BariJ !) But back to Eden’s quilt… The Joel Dewberry fabric is from his Aviary 2 collection and is the Woodgrain in the Bark color line that essentially trims out the quilt with the binding.
Here she is, above, playing with her appliquéd letter “E”. Or she’s thinking about eating her toe. Actually, I am pretty sure it is the second. Thank you to @CindySews for all her help, especially with the appliqué stuff. She is not only my sewing teacher, but also my dear friend. Between Cindy and her friend (now mine), Pam (who owns Delray Fabrics – you should buy all your modern fabrics there. Seriously) I find myself cracking up whenever we’re all together. Got a problem with one of the Real Housewives? Chat about it with Pam – she’ll back you up.
Couldn’t end this without my Sweet Eden’s gummy grin. I hope she reads this one day and knows all the love I put into this hand-made quilt. Baby girl, mommy L O V E S you to the moon and back!
kimmartucci 
