Hanging Solar Light Using Glass Chandelier Bowls and Dollar Store Items!

How to make a DIY hanging solar light by upcycling glass bowl light shades off of a chandelier and a couple of dollar store items. So when my mom and I gave her house a makeover it also included replacing several of the light fixtures. She has a small, quaint little place and the light fixture in her dining room was just way too big for the space so it was the first one that we replaced. I didn’t keep the actual fixture (Ah hindsight and regret!) however, I did keep all of the glass bowl light shades because it just seemed like I could use them somewhere…

I have several 8 foot 4×4 posts along the entire length of my deck. Each of these posts I hung a shepherds hook on for flower pots, bird feeders etc. but I’ve wanted something different for a while now.

I have six of these glass bowl light shades and knew I had room to hang four of them. (the remaining two I have another plan for!) It was only natural for me to think that I certainly needed to find a way to add a solar light too! My first stop was a trip to our local Dollar Store because I needed to find a way to hang each hanging solar light. I purchased the four solar lights for $1 a piece and the four hangers for the same!

Removing the bottom part of the solar lights I was left needing to run to my local Ace hardware for the perfect washer. It needed to be bigger around then the hole in the bottom of the glass bowl but the center hole had to be large enough for the solar light to slide into it.

Love Ace Hardware! I purchased the four washers for less then $2! All in these four solar lights cost me about $13!

I applied Gorilla Glue to the bottom of the washer and the bottom of the solar light before attaching them all together. (I did not quite go all the way around the bottom of the washer because I still wanted some drainage so these lights wouldn’t become water buckets every time it rained.)

At first I was gong to remove the chains from the hanging baskets and just use the chains but I liked the caged look around the bowl and it sat so perfect in them! (I added a little glue between the two of them too.) After hanging them up I have been really quite pleased!

Of course the coolest part is how pretty each hanging solar light is at night. You can see my old solar jar lights I made years ago are still going strong, but these really look elegant I think and put out a surprising amount of light!
Tutorial on how I used the last two bowl shades on the top of my posts is coming up soon!