The flush mount light fixture in our hallway has bothered us from pretty much day one. But, for some odd reason we decided to save this o’-so-tiny project until now, for your reading pleasure.
It’s not our style, and it’s always seemed a bit busy with the texture of the ceiling. We like the overall shape of this fixture, but the “gold” and the textured glass are a little dated for our space. And, well, yeah…. Also, C strolls through our local Habit-for-Humanity ReStore and finds killer deals on a regular basis. During this particular trip to “Heaven”, she found exactly what we wanted, that we had argued about at great length discussed after an amount of research that would make the average consumer bleed from the eyes/ears/fingertips.
Replacing a light fixture like this is pretty simple, thankfully. To take this down we just turned the power off, undid the set screws holding the globe on, took the light bulbs out (because we were going to reuse them in the new fixture), and then removed the screws holding base up and disconnected the wires. Which left us with this.
It was at this point that we noticed that the new fixture did not have the same mounting holes as the old one. Namely, it only had the center hole (for which there is obviously no stud above) and needed some smaller holes on the side to mount to the bracket shown above. So, we made some.
We measured and marked for the new holes with a sharpie-pen and drilled appropriately sized holes for the screws to hold it into the bracket. Then Helper Dog inspected it to make sure it didn’t contain food, and we went back inside.
Why is there no food?
We then simply repeated the take-down process in reverse. Tighten the screws, put the bulbs in, replace globe & tighten set screws, admire non-dated light.
Total project cost? $4.97
Gotta love with when you find the exact light fixture you wanted for one fifth of the price they go for in the big box stores.
Has anyone else finally gotten around to a simple project that kept getting put on the back burner?
Swivel Plate Caster, 8 In Dia
What a great, cheap project! I have to admit that I liked
the “before” fixture, though. I love the way pressed glass
sparkles. But I love that you were able to achieve the look you
wanted! I recently finished some small baseboard trim pieces that
weren’t super-obvious, but helped make things look tidier. We had
all the materials, so it was free. It was a little fussy, but it
felt great to get it done! Kim @ HousetoHomestead.com
Thanks Kim! I generally like pressed glass details, but it just seemed to be too much with the ceiling texture. We are thinking we’re going to donate the old fixture to ReStore, but before we do we might try it in another area.
I love it when small, free projects make an impact! Sometimes things that have gotten put off like that give the greatest feeling of satisfaction, too.
We went from this http: //www.flickr.com/photos/54995359@N05/5109004862/in/set-72157625226555336/ (hello, bleck) to this : http://www.housebella.com/2010/11/16/venture-into-lighting/ (hello, fantastic!) with a housing thrift store find. Bonus, the light we found was a Hubbardton Forge! Wowsa.
That’s awesome, Sara!
Such a big cheap easy update! Cute!
Thanks Heather!
It’s really amazing how such a small upgrade works like that. I’ve noticed that you can’t really tell until you do a before/after, and something small like an older light fixture replaced with a modern one really shows a huge difference.
Yeah, the before and after helps a lot :) I <3 small upgrades.
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