DIY Woven Lampshade

This DIY Woven Lampshade is an easy budget macrame project that will bring texture to your lighting! Includes step-by-step photo and video tutorial!

A few weeks back, I purchased some pretty nice lamps for $5 each at the Habitat for Humanity Restore. There was only one problem: they lacked lampshades.

Luckily, Habitat also has a selection of lampshades. It reminds me of buying mix and match bathing suits, just with lamps and lampshades instead of tops and bottoms. The only thing, was that they didn’t have two identical lampshades to match my two identical lamps.

So instead, I grabbed these:

They weren’t identical lampshades, but they were the same shape and size, which was all I needed to DIY something cute.

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DIY Woven Lampshade

Materials

• 4 mm Macrame Cord – I needed 200 yards per lampshade.
• Old Lampshade – I found mine for $2 each at my local thrift store.
• Scissors

Step 1: Remove Old Fabric From Lampshade

I used scissors to cut into the lampshade, then pulled all the fabric and liner off the wire frame.

I was concerned when I saw how rusty the frame was, but it didn’t cause any problems.

Step 2: Weave Horizontal Cord

Tie a basic knot on the top of one of the vertical pieces. I tied a double knot just to make sure everything is secure. If you are a fancy knot person, feel free to tie a fancier knot, but a basic knot worked fine for me.

Weave cord around the lampshade. At each vertical piece, wrap the cord around the metal once, then keep going around the lampshade.

I kept the cord attached to the spool in order to have one continuous piece, and just moved the spool around the metal when needed.

When the spool no longer fit through the wire (the cord was in the way,) I estimated how much cord I needed to reach the bottom of the shade, added more yards just to be safe, then cut the cord.

Once the vertical pieces are completely covered in cord, tie a knot around a vertical piece to secure the cord in place. Leave a couple inches extra, then cut any excess cord.

Step 3: Add Vertical Cord

Cut a piece of cord that is two times the distance between the top and bottom of the shade, plus a couple extra inches on each end. In my case, this was about 30 inches. See photo below.

Fold the cord in half, and use the middle loop to make a slipknot on the top row of cord.

Tuck the ends of the slipknot behind the horizontal cord, in the middle part of the shade.

Repeat this process along the top wire of the shade, adding another cord and slipknot directly above the first.

Then bring all four cords back to the front of the shade about halfway down.

Tie each cord to the bottom of the lampshade frame. Once again, a basic knot is fine.

Leave a couple inches of cord remaining to act as fringe.

Repeat until vertical cord has been added around the entire shade.

Step 4: Prepare Fringe

Unravel the fringe, then trim it with scissors so that it is even all the way around the shade.

Then attach the lampshade to the lamp, and enjoy!

Final Thoughts

This is an easy but time consuming project – definitely something you want to do while watching TV or listening to a podcast. The result, though, is worth the investment!

And it’s not a very expensive project. The original lampshades cost me $2 each, and the cord was 12-ish dollars a roll.

I love the way it turned out, and am so glad I took the time to do this project! If you like it too, be sure to save this post to Pinterest so you can find it again later! And if you want to stay updated on all of my recent projects, be sure to follow me on Instagram so you know exactly what’s going on!