Coconut Light Sculpture

Hi everyone, in this Instructable I show you how to build a stunning coconut light sculpture out of simple materials. This lamp/sculpture is made of basic and for everyone accessible materials and can be personalized as you like.

The lights are dimmable, to match your mood and create a cozy ambient in every room you put this lamp in!

The two coconuts are mounted on flexible plumbing pipes (more about that later), that allows you to move them around and sculpt the lamp as you feel. :)

Disclaimer: I lost some pictures of the making of this lamp. Still, I will give my best to describe you the process on how to build one by yourself.

• 2 x Coconuts (as big as you can find them);
• 1/2" diameter multi layer pipe for drink water or heating (around 3 meters);
• Hemp cord (of your desired thickness);
• 2 x E14 lamp holders;
• 2 x E14 lamps (I used 10W oven lamps);
• Electric cable;
• Dimm switch (I toke mine from an old dimmable lamp I found for free around);
• Some scrap wood;
• Hot glue & wood glue;
• Nails;
• Hammer;
• Screwdrivers;
• Drill bits and holesaws;
• Cordless screwdriver;
• Sanding paper;
• Dremel + small drill bits of different sizes;
• Knife, spoon or everything helpful to empty the coconuts;
• Tape

The coconuts have to be emptied first. I made a hole on the bottom of each nut and carefully emptied the inside coconut meet. It is a tedious process, so be patient. :)

The same hole will be used to mount the coconuts on the lamp, so be careful to not make a too big of a hole ;)

Once the nuts are empty and dry, we need to sand them down to get a nice and shiny surface.

Once the coconuts have the surface you are happy with, you can proceed with the creation of the light patterns.

For this step, you need a pencil or something that is visible on the coconut. Draw the pattern you would like to have on the coconut. This will serve as a guide for the drilling process.

As you can see in the pictures, I used a permanent marker. DON'T do my same mistake, or you have to re-sand the coconuts all over again!

Take the Dremel (or a similar tool) and start drilling your chosen pattern on the coconut. You can use different drill bit sizes to emphasize some patterns and hide others.

In this step, you will create the stand of the lamp sculpture, which is made of multi layer pipe.

The multi layer pipe can be bent in the way you like, giving the stand the possibility to be personalized and modified as you desire. My lamp never looks the same every time I turn it on! :)

The stand is build like follows:

Cut around 3 meters of multi layer pipe;

Drill a 10 mm hole in the middle of the pipe. This will function as escape for the electric cable;

Insert the electric cable for the lamps into the pipe, leaving around 30 cm of overhead from each end of the pipe;

From the hole in the middle of the pipe, access to the electric cable and wiggle it out for at least 10 cm. This will ease the future assembling steps.

Using the centre hole as a reference, bend the pipe in a circle of around 60 cm diameter (this will be the base of the lamp) and lead both ends of the pipe upwards, shaping the stand like in the second picture.

Here, you will create the connection between the stand and the E14 lamp holder, as well as finishing the cabling of the lamp.

First, create the lamp holder mount:

Cut some wood circles with the holesaw out of a piece of scrap wood (I used different sizes of holesaws to get a conical shape look);

Don't forget to drill 2 wooden pieces that fit in the stand pipe. Those, will be needed to fit the lamp holder mount to the stand.

Measure the coconut hole and drill a circle that fits snug into the coconut. This circle is the top piece of the "circle pile", on which the lamp holder will be mounted on (see pictures);

Usually, holesaws have a centre drill bit. This will automatically create a hole to pass the cable through for the lamp. If your holesaw does not have a centre drill bit, drill a hole in the centre of each circle;

Glue the circles together and clamp them down for drying. If you don't have clamps, you can also nail the circles together like I did. It's important to align the centre hole of the circles to allow the cable to pass through.

Once the glue is dried, nail two short nails on the side of the top circle of the "circle pile". These nails will serve to assemble and hold in place the coconuts; (see first 3 pictures)

Mark the position of the nails and Dremel out the same shape on the coconut. You can try now to insert the lamp holder mount into the coconut and rotate it. It should fit tightly enough to hold firmly in place the coconut; (picture 4 and 5)

Proceed with assembling the lamp holder mount onto the lamp stand:

Wiggle the electric cable through the hole of the holder mount so that it shows up from the other end;

Insert the holder mount in the pipe and glue it in place. I used a lot of duct tape for this. Don't worry if the result doesn't look nice. You will cover everything with a nice hemp cord ;)

Connect the E14 lamp holder to the electric cable and fix the holder to the wood circles. My lamp holder had a nice threaded end, so I was able to screw it in the centre hole of the wood circles. (see first 3 pictures)

Final cabling:

Once both lamp holders are mounted on the stand, it's time to finalize the electric connection on the base of the lamp.

Cut the outstanding cable on the base of the stand in half.

Each end of the cable is now connected to one lamp holder.

Connect both cable ends to the dimmer to finalize the electrics. For this step, follow the instructions of your component. (last two pictures)

To finalize the lamp, the pipe of the stand has to be covered. For that you can use whatever material you like the most. I choosed a nice hemp cord to give the lamp a warm and cozy appearance.

Start from the base of the lamp and wrap the entire base with the hemp cord.

Glue the ends, at the lamp holder mount with some superglue.

Mount the coconuts on the lamp holders.

Turn on the lamp.

Turn off the rest of your room illumination and.... voilà! Let yourself enjoy the amazing patterns this lamp makes on the walls of your room. Have fun adjusting the pipe to create new shadow patterns and relax. :)

I wish you lots of nice moments with this easy to build and stunning effect lamp! :)