Garden mood lighting is a category that I completely forgot about until we started updating our patio and seating areas this year. A few of these lovely lanterns with candles (I like battery powered ones) make a soft friendly flickering light that encourages relaxing and visiting. I’ve also made a few for friends to take to their parties as hostess gifts. These are made with fired on decals for an additional garden feel. You could use colored wine bottles for a more rainbow effect.
Materials needed:
Cut wine bottle
Copper Foil (optional)
Heavy stiff wire – copper, steel or stainless steel. I’m using stainless steel in the photos.
smaller bottle for votive holder
votive, either wax or battery
pliers
Chain and split ring
Step 1:
Make sure your small bottle will a. hold the votive, and b. fit inside the larger bottle:
- Selected Bottles
- Votive in small bottle
- Small bottle in large bottle
Step 2:
Bend wire in half to create a loop, the loop needs to be large enough it will not slip through the bottle neck. This will become the hanging loop for the lantern insert.
- Bend wire in half
- Loop size relative to bottle neck
Step 3: Creating the lantern insert:
- Bend both wires at right angles
- Bend wires in the center
- Fold one wire over the other
- wrap folded wire around the other
- Create a hanging loop
Put the wire back into the bottle and mark where you would like the small bottle to be suspended inside the lantern:
- Mark location for votive
- Mark the other wire at the same place
- Make a right angle in both wires
- Hold the corner of the right angle firmly
- Bend a loop in each wire, these will go around the small bottle
- Bend the other wire
- Wrap wires around bottle neck tightly
- Mark extra wire with about 1″ overlap
- Tuck the cut end of wire inside of the other wire to create a continuous loop
- Bend each wire slightly at an angle to keep them from escaping.
- Put lantern assembly back on the small bottle and adjust to fit closely
- Bend each wire tail back over the vertical
- Trim off extra wire and bend carefully to tuck cut ends close to the votive bottle.
Add lantern assembly to the wine bottle:
Step 4: Add hanging chain
- The split ring needs to be larger than the bottle neck
- Using pliers and a twisting
- motion. Loop through the lantern hanger
- and reverse twist to close.
- Feed wire through bottle and add split ring to other end.
Step 5: Add copper foil to the cut edge of the bottle (optional)
- Peel backing from copper foil and smooth onto very clean bottle.
- Burnish and smooth the copper with a wooden tool
- Fold copper over edge and smooth. Add a second piece of copper to the inside and repeat to fold over and seal bottle edge.
- Add solder to copper foil if desired.
Finished! Slide the bottle up the chain to light candle.