Love & Food in the Big D :): Restoration Hardware

Monday, May 19, 2014

Restoration Hardware - Star Light Hack

Since we moved into our Frisco house back in late August, I've been on quite the mission to make use of the MASSIVE amounts of cardboard that we've been able to accumulate as we've purchased new furniture over the last 9 months. It seemed like such a waste to just throw it all away.. especially since we had so many empty walls to contend with. I figured the first place where I could get away with trying to make cardboard "WORK"... would be the playroom.

Taking inspiration from things I'd seen on Pinterest... My latest craft project, slash obsession, was trying my hand at our very own marquee style star light.

When I saw this Restoration Hardware Baby and Child image on Pinterest, I just knew that I could easily replicate the star without the hefty price tag. $320!?!?! Yikes! Thanks, but no thanks. And this, my friends, is when my hoarding tendencies come in handy. ;)

Enter the biggest piece of cardboard I could find in our stash. (Didn't take long... we have TONS! ;) Carpenters hoard scrap wood, this DIY'er hoards cardboard. Sad AND true. ;)

In case you care to try and replicate this little cardboard gem, here are my very ROUGH instructions. (I'd be happy to elaborate if needed!)

**** Safety Note ****
Although I've seen lots of other projects on the internet where cardboard and string lights come in contact without any issue, you probably shouldn't leave this light on overnight or when someone is not in the room. Curious as to how hot these globe lights would get, I left them on for over an hour, and they were still cool to the touch. Even though I'm fairly confident there isn't a fire hazard associated with this hack, please use caution anyway. Better safe than sorry!

RESTORATION HARDWARE - STAR LIGHT HACK

- Using a template I had printed out of (6) 11x17's taped together... (cause I'm not good enough to free hand a star this big), I used an Exacto blade to cut out my star shape.

- I then cut out long 4 inch strips that would be glued to the edges to give me the "lip" I needed on both sides to account for the wirey mess in the back and the bulbs in the front.

- Using globe lights I had found at Target awhile back, I penciled in, (and cut out) the number of holes for the number of bulbs that came in my set. (Note here that I'm apparently REALLY, REALLY bad at counting cause I cut 26 holes for 25 bulbs... DOH!) Imagine my surprise when I THOUGHT I was done. ;)

I was pretty rough with my holes, just making them big enough to fit the bulbs in.. but not really caring that they were perfect little circles, realizing that they'd be covered up anyway. (I used my Exacto for this step too... the sharper the blade, the easier it is to cut these out)

Taking craft paint I had on-hand, I chose blue for the inside and red along the outer edge. (This was just one coat of blue into the project. I added another one shortly after just to darken the whole thing and make it less splotchy.)

I then took off all the lights that came in the set and set them aside to reassemble as I went along.

Turning my star over after everything had dried, I started at one corner and worked my way around the star, bulb in the front, wirey mess in the back. Pretty simple.