Ikea Lampshade Hack

At first, I thought it was the LED bulb I used – it was one of the “daylight” bulbs that make everything look stark and sterile (they’re definitely NOT my favorite). So I changed to a “warm white” bulb.

That wasn’t it.

I figured out that the plastic that made up the shade wasn’t transparent enough to let the light shine through. It’s possible that it wasn’t designed that way but to me, the light was irritating. It was shining straight up and straight down rather than radiating out and around.

This was a super-simple fix. I figured I could cut new plastic pieces that were less opaque, in the same shapes and reassemble the shade. I was hopeful that the light would shine through the shade itself…

I purchased a 10 pack of 10 MIL mylar sheets used for stencil making (

When recreating the pieces, I will admit that I cheated a little… I am a draftsman by trade and have access to tools that the normal person does not. I was able to copy the shapes into my computer program, then cut them out on our die cutting table (which has a blade exactly like an Xacto knife). The pieces can be cut out with scissors, a steady hand and an Xacto knife, or a heated stencil tool (like a wood burning tool!)

I reassembled the pieces on the existing hardware that came with the shade. Surprisingly, I didn’t have to make any tweaks and was super proud!

So this is how the lampshade came out and I LOVE IT! It shines exactly as I thought it would! I tried it with the daylight bulb I bought at IKEA…

Meh. I still don’t like daylight bulbs. The light is too cold for me!

So I inserted a warm white bulb and wow!! It is exactly how I thought the shade would look when I bought it. It radiates light like I wanted, and makes the corner where it is installed look bright and happy!

And because the whole pendant light is so lightweight, I hung it on the ceiling with Command clips for outdoor lights so I didn’t have to put a hole in the ceiling. So now the floor lamp in the corner behind it can be relocated and used elsewhere.

I know that everyone may not have this exact shade or a burning desire to do an Ikea lampshade hack but I was sharing this hoping that it would inspire others to think creatively out of the box! What do you think? Do you have an IKEA light shade hack?