This vintage candolier diorama is the final post on this 4-part series of DIY Christmas crafts. If you missed any of the others here they are:
This DIY vintage candolier diorama was such a fun project for me! I love creating vignettes and so this diorama, which is basically a vignette on a small scale, with an added bonus of a Christmas theme would be a given to be fun to create.
Unlike the vintage clock diorama that just sort of fell into place, for this vintage candolier diorama I ordered elements from many different places and patiently waited for all the different parts to arrive.
It started with this vintage candolier I bought from someone selling all their old Christmas decorations. It was still in the original box. The box is almost cuter than the actual candolier, it’s a bit plain and didn’t have the original halos.
So first thing I searched out and ordered with the exact same looking and sized, (C7 base) bulbs only in the LED version. Many ‘die-hard’ vintage Christmas collectors poo-poo LED bulbs… but not me!!
I love vintage Christmas, and I love not accidentally starting my house on fire… Those old bulbs get HOT! In fact, my 3-year old granddaughter came over this weekend and the very first thing she noticed was this vintage candolier and before any of the adults realized it, she stuck her finger up and touched the orange glowing bulb. Nothing happened, no screaming and tears for burned fingers, it was a non-event, because these LED bulbs don’t get hot at all. I love that!
From another source, I found reproduction halos in many different styles. I could order them with the center cutout size to fit my bulbs. They came with this little base clip that gets held in place with the lightbulb.
The halos slide and click over those base clips.
Now to the decorating of the diorama. I found a shop on Etsy that made really cute woodlets available in different sizes. I found this red cottage design that I could order in a good size for the right part of the candolier.
To have it partly on the base of the candolier and extend up towards the candles meant it would need a spacer on the back of it where it would be glued on the candles because they are set back from the base depth. You can see that space difference in the above picture.
I quickly made a spacer of sorts with some cardboard strips, folded and glued together.
The jimmy-rigged spacer then got glued onto the candolier.
I did just use hot glue to hold this diorama together. If I want to at some point take it apart and do something different, I may or man not be able to pop the hot melt glue off the plastic. I didn’t invest very much in the actual vintage candolier… if it was an expensive rare vintage piece, I wouldn’t have felt so comfortable gluing directly on it.
There is the red cottage…
Now to add to it…
This vintage candolier diorama is a real mix of old and new! I grabbed some of the vintage bottle brush trees from my collection.
The bottom of the tree shows the original price and maker. Fun!
Then at Walmart I found the last aqua deer ornament. I heard they apparently had a cute collection of vintage style reproduction ornaments this year, but got so picked over right away, I pretty much missed out on it all, but for one set of decorated bottle brush trees and this single cutie.
The last thing I added was the glitter ‘Merry Christmas’ sign across the top left part of the candolier. That glitter sign was actually rescued in a whole box of stuff I bought with an assortment of Christmas decor.
The finished candolier found a spot on the little antique cupboard between the living room and kitchen/dining room.
It really is charming with the halos shining and spreading the warm glow of vintage (looking) Christmas. I think that’s why our little Maddie couldn’t resist touching the orange glowing ‘flame’.
This 4 part DIY Christmas craft series was fun to share with you. I hope it’s inspired you to have some fun of your own with a little DIY festivities.
Coming up next week will be featuring more of my vintage Christmas ornament and decor collections showing you how I displayed some things and sharing some things I’ve learned about a few of the vintage ornaments.
Thanks so much for stopping by! Please feel free to follow and share this blog with your friends, as well as on MeWe, Facebook, Pinterest, Flipboard, Bloglovin, YouTube and Instagram! I appreciate you reading along.
Here you can check out all the Christmas decorating projects I’ve written about:
Lynnie says
So cute😍 My aunt had that candolier in her window for all our growing up yrs. When my son replicated her house as a miniature glitter house, he featured it in picture window. Brings a smile…!
Your crafts for the last two days have inspired ideas to do with the Grands!
Liz says
That is so fun! Yes, I am familiar with L. Thomas Peterson’s glitter houses… Amazing!! 😍😍 And I’m just so tickled to hear something here inspired you. Thanks so much for letting me know that! ❤️