Trashtastic Tuesday- Vintage MCM Lamps

Hey all! Welcome to Trashtastic Tuesday! This is a little series around here where I show you something that I thrifted, sometimes I make it over, sometimes I don’t. Or it may be something that I have owned and I am tired of, or no longer like, so I make it over. But nevertheless, it is usually something that I paid very little money for. I love this set of vintage mid century lamps that I am sharing with you today!

Now, let me preface this by saying that I do realize these lamps are not for everybody. Some people might hate these lamps! But when I saw these at the Habitat for Humanity Store, I was instantly in love with them. They were the very first things I saw upon walking into the store. I may have knocked a couple people over walked over to check the price and they were marked at $20 a piece. I usually do not try to haggle with people at thrift stores, but for some reason I decided to ask if the price was negotiable, and much to my surprise she said that she would take $10 for them both! That means they were $5 a piece! I immediately told her I would take them.

They had very large, tall white lamp shades, but they were dented and damaged, so I asked her to remove them rather than for me to try to dispose of them myself. So I brought them home without the lampshades. If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, I posted a few pictures of them, so you may have gotten a sneak peek.

At first, I wasn’t sure I would even keep them, but I was guessing that I could clean them up, add lampshades and sell them for way more than I paid for them. And if I liked them somewhere in my home, then all the better! One of the lamps was in working order, and one was not. The first thing I set out to do was get them as clean as possible. I am unsure if the metal on these lamps is brass or not. The first thing I did was to clean the glass parts of the lamps, and then I set out to shine up the metal. I tried using ketchup, but it really had no affect on how the metal looked. Then I tried mixing vinegar and salt mixed up into a past and applying that to the metal. It cleaned it up nicely, but did not change the patina on the metal. Since I don’t mind the patina, and they were all cleaned up, I decided to stop there and leave them as is.

Have you ever tried to rewire a lamp before? I had not. But I purchased a lamp kit at Home Depot and decided to give it a try. At this point, I had not tried plugging the other lamp in, but when I did, I was pleasantly surprised that inside the green glass base was a nightlight! The only problem with the lamp kit I bought is that it is not made for a three way switch, so that the night light would work. So I went ahead and used the kit I had for now, just so I could get the actual lamp working, but I saved the wiring from the night light, and I know I can go back at some point and get it working too.

The next thing to do was to pick out some lampshades for them. So one day last week, I headed to Target to see what I might find. I knew I wanted something very neutral because these lamps are quite busy in and of themselves. I started looking at lampshades, and it became clear that I was going to spend much more on the lampshades than I had on the lamps themselves. The lowest prices on any of them was around $16.99. I just happened to wander around the corner and look at the end caps that had items on clearance, and I noticed these lampshades on clearance for $2.25 each! I could not believe it, and they were perfect because they were neutral. they are kind of like a basket weave type of look, and I thought they fit the vibe of these lamps. So I brought them home to try them out.

What do you think of these lampshades? Do you think they compliment the lamps? I would love to read your opinion in the comments below!

As you can see, I decided to keep the lamps. They have found a home in our downstairs family room. If you click the link to our family room, you can see the lamps that we did have. I think these lamps add a little vibrancy and character to the room. This room is the room the kids hang out in when they have friends over.

I usually take pictures for the blog when the room has the best light of the day if possible. But for these lamps I decided to wait until the sun was going down so that I could turn them on and you could get the full affect of what they look like turned on.

We already have some pops of green in the room in the gallery wall above the sofa, and a cushion on the chair, so I thought the green lamps looked great in here!

I did some research on similar types of lamps for sale online, and the lowest price I found was $75, so I think I made out! I love these lamps and I think they are totally trashtastic! What do you think of them?

Thank you for joining me today for Trashtastic Tuesday! If you would like to check out my other Trashtastic Tuesday posts, you can click here. Here is a quick look at a couple of my past Trashtastic Tuesday projects.