Just Ask Hollywood

There are few things I love more than lights. Light can help set a scene, a mood and give those in its presence an impression. Just ask Hollywood, lighting matters.

Perhaps that's why I so deeply despised my living room lighting until just this week. 

When we moved in, the light was non-existent. One of the first things I did upon move in was put up a fan.

That dealt with some of the stifling heat (it was about 90 degrees inside at that point) and some of the style issues but didn't go nearly far enough for my taste. 

Still, as long as we didn't have air conditioning, the fan was necessary. 

Once I did put in AC, the fan wasn't leaving simply because I had too many other things on my plate. Just a few months later came new drywall and paint and I found myself wishing for new lighting.  

Funny enough, I got forced into my wish. 

During the drywall installation, my contractor took down two fan blades to cut around the fan (we couldn't get it down!) and put the screws in a piece of tape for later replacement. Sadly, I didn't know that and a small ton of masking tape went into the trash shortly after installation. I'm guessing the tape with the screws was one of those pieces since we never found it.

Without the balance provided from all of the blades, it sounded like a freight train about to fall off my ceiling every time it accidentally got turned on.

Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I decided I'd just run over to my favorite salvage shop, pick up a new (to me) fixture, rewire it and hang it. 

I'm sure this will come as a shock, but it wasn't quite that simple. 

I got all the way up to hanging the fixture when we realized that the bracket that holds it to the ceiling had been stolen at some point in the last hundred years. 

We couldn't hang my shiny new light fixture and I was forced to put up an ugly shade fixture that was wrong for my home in so many ways. On the bright side, it did provide light. 

This week, however, I was able to undo the wrongs of my past (or at least these particular wrongs) and hang a period correct light fixture in the living room at Isthmus House! 

My favorite salvage ship came through yet again with a bracket that we rigged a bit to attach the lamp to the ceiling. Then my electrician, who was already coming over to take care of another project, hung it up for me!

The fixture had four matching shades too, so those went right up. I think the chip in one of the shades adds a little character- what do you think? 

I definitely have some work to do, smoothing out that ceiling, but the living room is almost done! I can't wait to show off the final product!