The DIY Duo: A Glass Act

Each week, DIY lovers Shaina Stern and Lindsay Lipovich will demonstrate a quick and awesome project to add an extra twist of style to your life. We’ll show you how-to’s to impress your most craft-saavy pals. Get out your glue gun, because here comes the DIY Duo.

We’re back, and this time we’re bright. This week’s DIY project is to make your own light-up wall frame for some dazzling décor.

Our frame is an old wheel rim, but you can use any metal, firm wire base. More complex and unique frames will make for a more fun design. You may be wondering where we got an old wheel rim…We’ll leave that up to your imagination. Get creative.

What you’ll need:

1 metal frame
1 long set of white Christmas lights
Multiple empty glass bottles in various colors (start with 3 bottles, and add more as you need)
1 empty shoebox
1 paper bag
A hammer
A hot glue gun
A cup of water
Paper towels

1. For starters, rinse out your bottles. Then soak them in warm water to aid the removal of any labels.

2. In the meantime, you can begin to wrap your Christmas lights around the frame in whatever twists and turns you desire.

3. Using the hot-glue gun, glue the plastic base of the bulb, not the glass, onto the metal frame.

4. While you’re waiting for that to dry, put a cleaned (and dry) bottle into a paper bag. Using the hammer, gently break the glass. Small pieces are okay for some variation, but the larger pieces are easier to work with.

 

5. Carefully pour the shards into a shoebox so you can easily sort through colors, shapes and sizes while still keeping them contained. That last thing you need is shards of glass spilling all over your dining room table or bedroom floor. OUCH. (On that note, please be careful!)

6. Next, pick out a piece of glass and rinse it off in your cup of water. Dry it with the paper towel.

7. Shoot the hot glue onto the plastic base and attach the piece of glass. Make sure the glass fully covers the light bulb, but you don’t need to put any glue on the bulb. For safety purposes, start at the center of your frame and work your way out.

Editors Note: Please be careful! Glass cuts and glue burns. But what fun is a DIY project that’s not a little… wild?

Photos by Lindsay Lipovich

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