Wine Bottle Lamp

My sister and I saw some wine bottle lamps in a store over the summer and she asked me if I would make her one for Christmas. Sweeeeeet! Like I need another reason to guzzle a bottle of wine.

There are a bunch of tutorials on the web about how to make a wine bottle lamp and the ones I read were a little intimidating. The most important step is to find a glass or tile drill bit. I purchased the Bosch 4 piece Glass and Tile Drill Bit set from the Home Depot. These drill bits worked like a dream.

The second most important step is finding the right bottle of wine. I used a rather large bottle of Robert Mondavi Pinot Grigio. I chilled it, then drained the contents of the bottle directly into my gut over the course of a few hours while watching back episodes of Boardwalk Empire OnDemand. Freaking awesome series, by the way.

The next day, while sober, I washed the bottle and carefully removed the labels. I dried it as best as I could and allowed it to stabilize at room temperature for about an hour before drilling a hole on the side of the wine bottle for the lights to go in.


Safety first, chickens! Always wear eye protection and gloves when drilling anything, especially glass. Little glass fragments were flying all over the place, so I was glad I had my safety goggles on even though I looked like a dork.
 

Now here is the trick: the hole you drill is going to be quite small, and you have to stuff all these Christmas lights through there. What are you goning to do with that pesky female end that you aren't going to use? Cut it off!

Wait a second, you drunks! Unplug the lights first, otherwise you might be in for quite a shock. Seriously.

Here's another thing: some Christmas lights are composed of two wires intertwined and some are three wires (one being a ground wire, I guess). The first set I cut was composed of three wires, but I touched the ground wire to one of the other wires and ruined the whole string! Bogus! So I tried the next strand I had in the basement, which had only two wires. Fish the lights through the little hole, taking care not to cut your finger or the wire on the hole.

Fish them all the way through to the top of the bottle so that your little cut wires are sticking out. They need to be covered in electrical tape, or you can do what I did and drilled holes in the bottom of the cork and secured them there.

I added some liquid gasket crap I found in the garage around the hole to secure the wire.

Here is the finished product:

You likey? I might make one for myself.