Outdoor Chandelier

I've been wanting to make an outdoor chandelier.

Supplies Used:
-one old funky light frame
-wire cutters and pliers
-prisms and crystals
-tea light candles/solar lights
-galvanized wire


Yesterday while I was running all over town doing errands (wow its hot out finally!) I managed to stop at this funky old place Hippo Hardware to check out their lighting supplies... I purchased an old piece-o-crap beat up simple chandelier frame, I ripped out the guts (the electrical lights and wires) and hung it outside. I mean to paint it, for now it just looks like weathered brass, I sorta like its ghetto-fabulousness at the moment :) Hippo also sells prisms and sparkly bits to fix chandeliers, so I bought a bunch of that stuff too and hung some bling off the old frame. I bought some cheap solar lights from the hardware store (the things you put along your path to light it up at night) and ripped the sticks off them so they can stick into the part of the chandelier that supposed to hold lights. I also played around with putting citronella candles in the chandelier - which looks great and produces a lot of light - however I like how the solar lights stay on regardless and lets the chandelier sparkle in the darkness of my backyard at night. Its romantic and beautiful. And its a great re-use of a really ugly old light fixture. Its now resurrected as a beautiful outdoor chandelier to go above my picnic table. I LOVE it.

for more pictures of the chandelier: check out my flickr

Adventures with Hubert

Hubert (the car) and I went on a errand run today. Fantastically productive. Fun places too!
I packed the car with boxes and bubbles at Carton Services and then wound around town picking up silver wire from West Coast Findings (for making earring wires, I seem to now require an endless supply of earwires) and I bought a new wire cutter... its a sweet little number... gotta love good tools.

Then I went to Hippo Hardware and checked out the chandelier parts they had on hand. WOW that was fun. I've never been to this place before and it was terrific, totally packed with nick-nacks. The top floor was all lamps and parts of lamps. There was an entire wall of drawers that are filled with chandelier parts, organized drawers of crystals prisms and metal widgets. Oh yeah baby. I've been wanting to find old crystal prisms to make more rainbow making mobiles (like this one) and this place was perfect. They have new ones and used ones. I picked out a handful of different size used ones and one ball prism for myself because I love them! it was new, they didn't have any used ballz :) oh my.
Okay, so Hippo Hardware was a very fun place. I also hit up SunLan Lighting for some more photoflood bulbs, mine seem to have all blown within the last few weeks. That place is also very fun (big store full of nothing but lightbulbs?! whats not fun about that)
Oh here are more pictures of Hippo Hardware, although I also ran around to Harbor Freight, and the Marine Fishing Store (swivel source) and then up to the glass studio to pick up some of my work...

The picture above is a staircase that was lined with doorplates and keyholes of all types and sizes... and then the picture below is a manikin dressed as a nun (in flippers) G pimpin' in a bath tub. Yep. I'll say it again, I enjoyed visiting Hippo Hardware, and I walked away with a bunch of neat old prisms for about a buck a piece.

Mobile of Rainbows

After some serious procrastination I have finally finished this beautiful mobile of prisms. A big thank you shout out to my friend Maggie for making this happen! Without your help I don't how I would have done this!
Here's the story - a customer of mine gave me a prism collection to make a mobile. Lots of prisms, at least a hundred I would guess (I never did count). The sheer quantity intimidated me, but the fun of all these rainbow-makers tickled my brain.
I told my friend Maggie about the project and she lit the fire under my butt to get going on the project. We got together 3 or 4 times to complete the mobile. At first it was just a matter of digesting all the little (and big!) prisms, connecting strong plastic coated steel wire to each one (fishing line degrades in UV light).
In the end I think the mobile turned out gorgeous. Its hard to take good pictures of a mobile, especially one so busy and translucent as this one... but I think I captured the process :)

I especially like the big ball prisms, they were my favorite - they are at least 2" in diameter and absolutely wonderful! If you click on the picture above (or any of the pictures) they get bigger so you can see the detail of these awesome prisms.
There were 5 prisms I picked out right from the get-go, sorta the geeks of the bunch, the odd ones that stuck out like sore thumbs. I made a small mobile out of just them :)