Soda Can Tab Small Diagonal Pendant Light

So you are all probably getting a bit sick of these soda can tab lights, but this should be the last one for a while because my obsession seems to have run its course, at least for the time being.  Since I was exploring a new concept, I started with a small drum shade to see if the concept would work and if I was happy with the final results.  And I am!

Personally I think the diagonal design is a bit more ‘shimmery’ and sort of reminds me of a fish.  Though then again maybe I’m just nuts…  Anyone else see a goldfish of sorts?  No, just me?  Maybe its this photo, something happened between the ambient light and the dimmed low level incandescent bulb, the orange color sort of reminds me of this goldfish hanging light I saw somewhere.  It certainly is a pretty result!  (Then again it also reminds me of chainmail, which isn’t connected to goldfish, so who really knows.)

I used the trusty Lobbo shade again, which I just love, especially because it comes flat so it is easy to store before use, and its especially easy for drawing guidelines on.  That’s how I made this light, I carefully drew guidelines onto the shade using a triangle I have left over from my architectural drafting days.  

I spaced the lines 1/2″ apart, horizontally, though I found out in retrospect they could have been a bit closer together for a proper overlap.  Though it does leave more white space which is an interesting and different look so its hard to say if it was a ‘mistake’ or not.  I’m still deciding that.

I discovered early that because of the diagonal, you ended up with a jagged bottom (and therefore top) edge, but I actually think its pretty cool looking.  To glue the tabs onto the shade, I picked an arbitrary spot and started by gluing two tabs in place, and then overlapping one tab on top of those two, plus extending it further towards the bottom of the shade.  Its a bit hard to explain, but it should make sense when you are looking at the physical pieces in front of you.  

The width of the tabs then widened slowly as I went around, working along in a growing triangle shape.  Because each tab is overlapping another one and there isn’t a ‘bottom row’ to start with you have to build it up slowly, rotating the shade as you go.  For me the right edge of the tabs basically started making a straight line, but because it is going diagonally up the shade the number of tabs needed for each row increases as that right edge gets further from the horizontal bottom edge of the light.

One thing I’m left wondering, though, is if this design would work well in a larger size.  I know the straight edged look worked really well in a wider shade but I’m not so sure about the diagonal.  There’s something about the vertical shape of the small shade that really helps accentuate the diagonal lines.  Maybe if I kept the largest Lobbo shade in its original squarer shape instead of cutting it down like I did for my large version, but I just don’t know.  I guess I’ll see if I get any nibbles on Etsy before exploring the idea.

I hope you enjoyed this newest iteration, and as I said I promise that this should be the last soda can pop tab light for a while, unless of course inspiration strikes!

Check back early next week, I hope to have some fun photographs to show everyone, followed by a bright and colorful new project (that isn’t a light!)  Ciao, Allison

Book Pages Pencil Cups

I am so excited about today’s project, because for the first time in a while, it’s not a light! Don’t get me wrong, I love my lights, and the first idea that always pops into my head with a new material is “could that be a light?”  But sometimes, it is refreshing to do something different, and it can spark your imagination in new and unforeseen ways.

As you may know, I make lights out of old books.  Old books that I cut up.  Specifically I cut circles out of them, to make my Artichoke Mixed Book Page Light.  (Which I first explored in this 30x30x3 post before discovering the key was full circles, not just simple scallop shaped pieces.)  Many, many circles…

I love finding a new use for a forgotten about item (often I collect unwanted books from friends or used book sales), but once I cut the circles out there is still a chunk of book left.  I always carefully save the left over pieces and recycle them with my newspaper and cardboard, but sometimes I’ve wished I could do more, that I could find some other cooler use for the left over part of the pages.  And then, a couple of weeks ago, I had a stack of the pages sitting there and suddenly a lightbulb went off.  Wait a second, I essentially have a rectangle with two circular holes in it.  What can you do with holes like that?  Use them to hold things!!

Of course I immediately began racking my brain as to what would be the right shape and size.  An existing metal pencil cup I had didn’t fit, and neither did a piece of cardboard tube I’d been holding on to.  And then I remembered these two small cardboard tubes that I had from a fancy invitation I got in the mail.  They were so cute that I had been keeping them hoping that one day I’d find a good use for them, and what do you know I found one!  They were the perfect fit, especially because they were just slightly smaller than the actual holes which made it easier to get through the stack of books, and it allowed for the small variation in exactly hole location in each page.

Overall, I think the key to this project was ‘less is more’ at least in terms of production methods.  Basically, I cut out a piece of scrap cardboard that was just a little bit smaller than my book pages.  Then I glued one book page down on top, to serve as a template for where to glue down my cans.  The bottom of the cans had a little bit of an edge, so I also cut out a piece of cardboard to fill-in that bottom part, and give me an even and level surface for gluing the cans down to the base.  After gluing the cans in place, I basically just started adding book pages, dropping them down from above, with the one hole going around each can.  I didn’t use any glue because you really don’t need it, and it can start making the pages wrinkle or scrunch up in funny ways.  

I also noticed with this first attempt that the spine-edge of the pages still had some of the rubber glue on it, so it looked different.  I probably could have just kept a nice mix of orientations so each side of the pencil cup had some spine edges and some clean edges, but I decided instead to keep all of the pages sitting in the same direction.  However, because of the glue residue the spine edge side of my pencil cups stuck up a bit higher than the other side.  But I discovered that if I pushed it down to be level with the clean edge side of the pages, and then smeared hot glue on the spine edges, they stuck together in this more compressed manner and you could make the top of your structure level again.  I think for my next version though I might try quickly trimming off the glue residue so that both sides lie equally flat.  And that way you’d have a double sided finished product instead of something that has a ‘good’ side and a ‘not-so-good’ side.

I also learned that my cardboard tubes were a bit tall for holding pencils and pens, so I cut out a bunch of cardboard circles to drop down into the bottom of the cans, to raise everything up.  I measured the height of an existing pencil cup I am using but I still think it might be too tall, especially for those short colorful pens!  Maybe I can use this for special items, taller special items like the unsharpened pencils and scissors.  

Another thing I love about this project is how it can get the wheels spinning in my head.  I already have ideas for how I can take this and build on it!  For once I’m cutting circles out of books thinking as much about the left over pieces as I am about the actual circles!  Its fun to see a supply like this in such a different and unique way, and it makes me feel like I’m doubly recycling these books!  So stay tuned, one of these days I just might have a project update based on this very pencil holder.  I guess it depends on how many circles I’m going to be cutting out in the future, and if I have enough time when I’m not supposed to be making lights that I can try some new projects.

Have a lovely week everyone, ciao!  Allison

Art Around NYC – Clocktower Gallery

A few weeks ago I had the chance to visit the Clocktower Gallery here in New York, as part of a Guggenheim Intern program.  To quote the website, “The Clocktower Gallery is a non-profit art center located in lower Manhattan.  Founded in 1972, the Clocktower has long been the site for ground breaking exhibitions and art residencies.  The Clocktower is also home to AIR, Art International Radio.”  And its built right below this really cool looking clock tower!  Check out the awesome photos from their website:

Basically its this kind of trippy gallery space, where they have artist residencies, and run a radio station, and have music performances.  They have a larger space on the official top floor of the building, and then a private staircase up into the room right below the clock, with access to this amazing wrap around deck with those big stone eagles.  Here are some great pics I snapped of the view, we all sort of decided that this was just the kind of place you’d fire off the Bat signal from!

This was one of those amazing spaces where everything you saw was probably art of some kind.  They had these funny ‘talking’ light bulbs that flickered on and off along with recordings and would bicker back and forth.  They sort of looked like strobe lights and were part ‘cool art’ and part ‘annoying flashing.’  I’m still debating that one.  I also loved the staircase up into the official ‘Clocktower Gallery,’ it was all covered in graffiti, and was really gorgeous.  I stupidly only had my iPhone with me so the pics are a bit grainy, but you get the idea.

And then, coolest of all, right up in the Clocktower Gallery there was this art piece/installation/architectural fabrication, honestly I’m not really sure what you’d call it.  But whatever you’d call it, it was so amazingly awesome, oh and bright orange!  The curator in charge of the gallery who gave us the tour said that the piece also had this upper stage space, so it could be incorporated into the musical performances they have in the space, I think that’s the upper deck space.  

Personally I think it looks like it would make an amazing playhouse.  I mean there’s that interior space that could be a desk for doing homework, the upper space could be like a tree house, you could decorate it with christmas tree lights.  Seriously, coolest playhouse ever!  Now I’m sad I didn’t have one as a kid.  Though who am I kidding, I wish I had this space right now, forget the kid part…

 

New project to come Monday!  Ciao, Allison

Soda Can Tab Large Drum Shade

Sunday greetings everyone, things have been a bit crazy around NYC recently, due to the freak snowstorm yesterday!  We may have crazy weather, but we’ve never had snow in October, and enough that it actually started sticking to things!  I’ll include some photos of the snow at the end of this post, but for now I have a fun new project to show everyone.  I thought while we were discussing drum shades I’d show you guys how the large version of my soda can tab light came out! 

Recently I posted about my first foray into using soda can pop tabs for a light.  I love this small size, and can totally see a string of them over a bar or kitchen counter.  But, I had also really wanted to experiment with doing a much larger size, for a real statement piece, and something that would look fantastic over a table or as the main light in a room. So here it is, and I think (if its possible) I love it even more than the original small size!!

Overall the light is approximately 14 1/2 inches wide (diameter) and 9 inches tall.  I used the same Lobbo shades, but this time I used the largest size they offer.  However, the original shade is very square, its 14 wide by 13 high, and I wasn’t crazy about that aspect ratio.  I really wanted a final light that was rectangular so that the width was really emphasized.  So, I simply whipped out my Xacto blade and cut it down to a more appropriate height.  (Though I made sure to measure the light fixture first and make sure that they light bulb would still be adequately covered by the shade.)  Overall I’m really happy with these dimensions, I think it nicely captures the rectangular aspect ratio I was looking for, and I love how wide it is!

Annoyingly, I’ve found it a bit difficult to photograph.  I find all of these Soda Can Tab lights a bit tricky, but this one is even harder because it is so large and the detail is so small and almost finicky.  Also the reflective qualities of the silver metal make lighting the shade quite difficult, and I’ve even had trouble with colored light from my TV reflecting off of the shade!  I also have trouble with the lack of light in my apartment (especially now that we are entering the winter months and the sun is lower in the sky.) One day maybe I’ll have my own studio, with big windows and a place to set up a clean white backdrop, and a whole little setting with furnishings to give my lights nice context. Ah, a girl can dream can’t she?  (Of course most girls probably dream of diamonds, I dream of real estate, I’m weird like that, its the architect in me I guess.)  For now I’ll stick to my favorite set up with this fun colorful Japanese print and gorgeous Japanese basket.

Overall this light used almost 1500 pop tops!!  Personally I chose to glue them on with the light already assembled into the drum shape, but I sometimes wonder if I could have just as easily glued them on while it was still flat.  I was worried that the curvature would do something funny to the pop tabs if they had been glued on while flat, so it was just easier not to risk it.  It’s not too difficult gluing them on while the light is curved, but the whole process does take a LOT of time!  I did this shade over a few different evenings, partly because I could only stand to glue on so many pop tabs at one time.  But also just because of how long it took.  I would estimate at LEAST 10 hours, possibly more.  At least it is relatively mindless work and so I can watch movies, though I try to either choose something I’ve seen before or something I don’t care that much about because a project this detailed takes a lot of visual concentration, or you’re likely to glue the pop tabs on crooked, or even worse burn yourself!  Hot glue is, of course, pretty hot but what I hadn’t realized before starting was how quickly it would conduct through the metal of the tabs!  Its a bit tricky trying to glue something small into place when it starts getting too hot to handle.  I found speed was essential, plus the ability to remove pieces if they were crooked.

I’m going to try and post some more Art Around NYC posts soon, because I’d like to begin posting more frequently if I’m able to with my schedule.  But, I also have a couple of other new projects in the works and some people might be excited to learn, they aren’t lights! That’s right, I am actually working on two new projects that aren’t lights.  Well, one was supposed to be a light that sort of backfired, but the other project was never, ever, meant to be a light.  Even I get sick of lights sometimes, and its always fun to try new things so I’m excited that I’ve finally had time to play around a bit and make some fun new projects for myself.  Though don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll have plenty of new lights to show you all soon!  In fact I might space out my new non-light projects a bit, for more variety.  We’ll see how quickly I get things finished and photographed, and if the daylight in my apartment behaves.

And now as promised, a few photos from yesterday, including one of Basel reluctantly braving the storm.  He loves snow but hates slush because it just makes his paws all wet and cold, not to mention the rest of him that is so close to the ground!

Ciao, hopefully no one was hit too hard by Snowtober, and everyone is staying warm and dry and looking forward to a good week!  Allison

(P.S. – Here’s the link to this light in my Etsy shop, in case anyone wants more physical details or is nervous about making their own and would like to purchase one.)

Faceted Pendant Lights – The Large Drum Shade

So my large faceted sphere light has been attracting a lot of attention recently, and one reader asked how much light it cast and if they could use it to light a room.  It struck me that maybe this was the perfect time to introduce this fun variation on my faceted lights, a drum shade!

One thing I really love about the drum shade concept, is that no matter what you cover the shade with and how much light it might obstruct, you are still going to get plenty of light pouring out the top and the bottom of the fixture which can really light a room nicely.  It works really well over a table or another space perfect for spot lighting, but it also bounces a ton of light off of a white ceiling which can really help spread the light around an entire room.

For this shade I once again went back to my trusty Ikea Lobbo shade to use as a base, and then I made a piece of what you could call ‘fortune teller fabric.’  I think when I posted my small sphere light I had mentioned this technique of locking the fortune tellers together. It is really fantastic, and allows you to create this cohesive piece of fortune tellers all glued together.  You take four units, and lay them out in a square, which will have eight points on each side.  You then take a fifth unit, and drop it down onto the four center points, one from each of the four original fortune teller units.  If you add a bit of glue you have then locked those five units together.  You keep adding units, first to the under layer and then filling in the top layer until you have a piece that is two layers thick, and however wide and long you need.

For this light I decided to build this piece up on the diagonal, so each fortune teller unit looks more like a diamond than a square, but it really doesn’t matter.  I built my fortune teller fabric up until it was the same height as my shade, and then I kept growing the length until I had enough to wrap completely around my shade.  I usually measured it out so that once it was glued in place, the ends were two rows of under layer units touching, and then once it was attached to the shade I would glue on the top layer units to lock the whole piece together.  I used my trusty hot glue gun and unless you pull on the paper those fortune tellers aren’t going anywhere!

I love the regular pattern the pieces create, and I think the shadows that play off of the white paper are really cool.  The whole piece measures approximately 14 inches across and about 10 inches high, but you could always cut down the height of the Lobbo shade a bit to change the aspect ratio to be more of a horizontal rectangle.

Because the light has to pass through the plastic shade and multiple layers of paper (at least four layers in most places) I found that the shade glowed, but really didn’t let much light pass through from side to side, but honestly I think this makes the shadows so much more interesting!  Especially when you see it next to a wall, you get this interesting dark band where the shade is and then these nice curved shapes of light.

I think this makes a fantastic pendant shade, but it also would make a great table light! My dad was actually so excited when he saw it that he wants me to cover the shade of one of his existing table lights, which I think will look amazing in his new modern apartment! I promise to show everyone before and after photos as soon as I get started on that project, don’t worry.

I hope everyone enjoyed today’s twist on a blog favorite, and hopefully anyone who was wondering about making a large faceted light of their own but wasn’t sure about the amount of light that would be transmitted now can consider doing this project instead. (Especially since there is so much air flow around the light bulb that you can probably get away with a stronger bulb than in one of the paper lanterns.)

Ciao, Allison

Art Around NYC – BMW Guggenheim Lab

This summer was a pretty exciting time for The Guggenheim Museum here in NYC.  Along with stillspotting (    ) nyc they also collaborated with BMW on the beginning of a really cool six year project, called the BMW Guggenheim Lab.  

Here is the description from the official website: “Part urban think tank, part community center and public gathering space, the Lab is conceived to inspire public discourse in cities around the world and through the BMW Guggenheim Lab website and online social communities.”  I love this graphic which they used to make up their logo, it is constantly changing based on thoughts people can enter on the website, almost like a live twitter feed!  Here are two additional versions that I spotted online on two different days:

The project will continue for 6 years, visiting 9 cities across 3 continents, with structures designed by 3 different architects.  There are three 2 year cycles, and each cycle will follow one structure from one city in North America, to a city in Europe and finally a city in Asia.  This first cycle began in New York this summer with the fabulous structure designed by Atelier Bow-Wow (a firm from Tokyo) and will now travel to Berlin this Spring and then on to Mumbai later next year.  Then a new 2 year cycle will begin with a new structure, and a new 3 cities.  Here’s a great photo of the lab from their website:

And another great photo from the website, taken by Paul Warchol, showing the lab from the street right outside the gates.

I was lucky enough to see it under a few different scenarios during its 16 week stay in NYC.  We visited as a group during an average day and got to play the funny game they had set up, called Urbanology which you can still play online here.  Then I attended a few fun evening events, including an awesome concert from Norah Jones and The Little Willies.  Here are a few of the best photos from that, they closed the gauzy white curtains to create almost a tent atmosphere, and with the lights and music it felt like a really fun outdoor club!

The structure by Atelier Bow-Wow is designed almost like a theater fly, where all of the equipment and furniture can be loaded into the rigging above, with open flexible space below.  Its constructed from carbon fiber, really amazing new light weight technology that is being used to make boats and even airplanes! (All these photos were taken during my various visits to the lab, unless I mention otherwise.)

The lot is where an old brownstone building once stood, and has been owned by the Parks Department of NYC for decades but has sat vacant and behind gates until now.  The brick walls that enclosed the space were covered in graffiti, which I think gave it a really great urban feel and is kind of gorgeous in its own right.  (The photo on the right shows the game board for Urbanology.  They had really cool ‘game pieces’ fabricated too!)

In addition to the main building there were also two smaller wooden structures, a cafe and the bathroom facilities.  The park made sort of a T shape, so while the lab structure was in the main body of the T, there was open park along the top piece, with a wood structure at each end.  These wood buildings were much closer to traditional Japanese architecture, and were gorgeous in their own right.  I especially loved the wood screening on the bathrooms, the light effects at night were just stunning!

Unfortunately the lab has now closed here in NYC, but if anyone lives near Berlin or Mumbai you should stay tuned for future events!  And remember, there will be two additional structures visiting two new North American cities (the specific cities are still being kept under wraps) over the next 6 years so if you think this looks cool and interesting sign up on the website to be kept in the loop with information.  And if you happen to be visiting NYC in 2013 there will be an exhibition at The Guggenheim Museum about the discussions that took place during the first two year cycle.  Here are a few closing shots of the lab during twilight.

Have a lovely weekend, and stay crafty!  Ciao, Allison

Soda Can Tab Small Pendant Light

A few weeks ago I was down in DC and had a chance to spend some time with my college roommate.  Since she had witness a lot of my crafting first hand she was curious about the lights I’ve been making, and we spent a while brain storming what sort of materials I could try using next.  I don’t remember exactly what made me think of it, but suddenly all I could see was the tabs from soda cans, layered like chain mail, hanging from a drum shade!  Of course I had the small hiccup that I don’t actually drink things that come in cans (I hate carbonation so no soda, and no beer) but of course once again Etsy came to my rescue!  I swear no matter how strange my idea I can almost always find the supplies I need on Etsy, I know I shouldn’t be surprised by that any more but I guess I still am.

This light is actually my fourth attempt to bring my idea to fruition, because at first I really had the idea of jingling hanging pieces and so I attempted to sew the can tabs (or pop tops I guess some people call them) onto various materials.  I started with a wire mesh with 1/4″ holes, but the mesh was so rigid that I found the tabs didn’t hang nicely.  I was also attempting to sew them on with thin metal wire, and the whole project was just becoming too difficult.  

Next I briefly tried a piece of left over mesh laundry bag, and discovered that the fabric nature of the bag was much better for the tabs (as was simple thread.)  But, my laundry bag was white which didn’t look great, plus it didn’t have any structure to it which I was worried about.  So my final attempt was to use window screening, which was softer than the wire mesh but more structural than the laundry bag. And the thing is, the screen was working really well, but about 7 tabs in I realized, this is going to take freakin’ forever! And I just did not have the patience.  Go figure.

 

So, I turned to my trusty glue gun and thought, I wonder what would happen if I just glued them straight onto a plastic Lobbo shade?  Success!  The tabs are so light weight that they certainly aren’t going to pull at the glue and start falling off, plus they are so heavily shingled that once you have a second row in place the first row doesn’t really have anywhere to go.

I learned two things with this first little shade (which I love and can totally see in a set of 2 or 3 hanging over a bar or kitchen counter!)  First thing, take the extra time and draw pencil guide lines on the shade before you start gluing the tabs in place.  (Since the shades arrive flat its easy to do.)  I thought it would be easy to keep the straight lines because you are just following the openings in the previous line of tabs (and the bottom line of tabs followed the bottom edge of the light) but about a third of the way through my shade I realized that one side was a bit lower than the other side.  Oops!  The second thing I learned was, thank goodness I didn’t try to make this light using my tabs from soda cans I actually drank, because it takes WAY more tabs than I originally would have thought! This one small 6.5 inch x 7 inch light took approximately 600 can tabs!  Unbelievable.

I guess I also did learn some other things.  Metal makes your hands really dirty, so beware of what you touch after you work on a light.  It also can leave little scratchy marks all over your table, so put something under the light before you end up with an abstract piece of artwork on your favorite white table top.  (I have this shade now helpfully sitting on top of a shag carpet sample I was about to throw away.)  I also decided that in order to keep the same small bits of white shade showing uniformly over the whole shade I would need to hang the bottom row off the end of the light (which actually looks pretty cool once done) and to have a double thick row of tabs around the top, which I probably unfortunately sticks out wider than the rest of the rows, but isn’t a bad detail for the top of the shade.

I love how this shade looks but now I’m wondering, what other sizes might work?  And also, what would happen if I decided to shingle the tabs horizontally around the shade? Would it look like scales on a fish?  Hmm… I may have to try that!  Now that I’ve found my newest obsession, stay tuned for other tab lights to start popping up around here and my Etsy shop!  (As usual, this light is available for sale for anyone who thinks the final result is cool but the project sounds daunting.)

For now, stay crafty and stay hydrated!  (Anyone else really want to open up a can of soda right now?  I may not like carbonation, but I love the sound the tab makes when it pops open.  If only I could include sound effects with my lights…)

Ciao! Allison