The Lightbulb Moment

As a renter with dubiously discoloured lighting cables, I have often dreamed of replacing my off-white plastic flex with a more funky, vintage-style fabric number (not a very rock ‘n’ roll statement, I know – at least Martha would approve though). Having recently replaced the horrendous lampshade provided with my flat (a 90′s-style boxy thing in red fabric, making the room look rather brothel-esque from the outside with its scarlet glow) I decided the flex needed an overhaul too – but how, when rewiring wasn’t an option?

Well, funny you should ask: inspired by my deeply lovely new Kura lampshade from Habitat (not-entirely-dissimilar to Skandium’s Le Klint lighting but a snip at a mere £25), I wanted the look from the instore display – a crisp white shade offset beautifully by hanging on a striking red fabric flex.

And then the lightbulb moment hit me (boom boom!) I grabbed my rickety wooden ladder, a generous length of red ribbon (though wool should work too, which I was originally going to use until I realised I didn’t actually have any), scissors and double-sided tape, and off I climbed for my mini-make-over. Firstly tying the ribbon around the base of my light fitting then wrapping the ribbon over to disguise it, I slinked my way to the ceiling, this time just securing the remaining flap of ribbon to the flex with a little double-sided tape (allow approx 3x more ribbon than the length of your flex).

The texture created from overlapping the ribbon on the way up gives a rather charming ‘wibble’ and just generally makes the whole thing look infinitely more chic, in my humble opinion. Climb up a ladder and have a go yourself during a spare moment – unless you’ve got something better to do, like throw your TV out of the window or give some orders to your entourage…

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