New Apartment Unveiling: Lighting

A few people (mostly my mom…) have been clamoring for photos of the new place. It’s mostly unpacked and I’ve been acquiring things to round out the design over the last week but there are a few finishing touches – like hanging the photo collage and unpacking those last few boxes – that are preventing me from taking “final” photos. Instead, I’m going to unveil the apartment little by little as I finish up those tasks.

Today, I want to brag on the lighting a little.  Mostly because I lit the apartment with four new lamps and spent... under $100!

Want to read the whole story?  Click the link after the photo for more!

I moved to a 475 sq foot studio with no overhead lighting.  My last place was 900 sq feet and had overhead lights and ceiling fans in every room.  I owned exactly one lamp and it was $5 at Ikea back when I was still in college.  It didn’t exactly get the trick done when lighting the whole room.

Living Room

The living room side was calling for lamps.  I found these two at Gordmans for $75 total. 

More than I would usually spend on lamps to be honest, but they fit the mood of the apartment and I was really sick of sitting in the dark at night so I decided they were worth the price.  Oddly enough, they are the same color with the bulbs off but appear to be different colors when they are turned on.  No idea why but at least they still match the décor.  Once the living room is done, I promise I'll post a picture of them in their "natural habitat" because they don't really sit next to each other all the time!

Bedroom

The bedroom side of the apartment has an outlet that connects to a light switch so I knew I wanted overhead lights of some sort on that half.  Remember my DIY Chandelier post last week?  After careful consideration, and really an inability to make up my mind, I decided to at least look at what I could buy for drum shades.  When I found these for $8 at Walmart I realized there was no point in spending more time and money when this was so simple!

It did take some work finding light kits to hang.  Ikea sells these but the closest Ikea is 2 hours from here and I refuse to drive 2 hours for a $5 light kit.  Home Depot doesn’t even sell them but the employees were helpful for once (I usually avoid Home Depot due to crappy customer service) and suggested I try $6 clamp lights.  By removing the clamp and cheap shade, wiring the shade to the light socket, creating a cord cover, and plugging these into an extension cord, I was able to create overhead lighting.

How did they turn out?

Is it perfect?  No.  I still need to do a little tweaking and true crafters are probably seeing all of the flaws.  But it certainly does the trick and it’s the perfect soft lighting to read by every night.

Yet again, I'll give you the full bedroom picture when I'm ready but I’m proud of the work I’ve done so far in the rest of the place; I’m just not quite ready to show you more!  Hope you like it – stay tuned for the bigger picture!