This past spring Daniel and I went on a road trip from San Francisco to the Grand Canyon. Along the way we stopped at Chateau Julien for a wine tasting. I wanted to do something with the empty bottle instead of throwing it in the recycling bin. So here it is!
You’ll need:
an empty wine bottle
a drill
safety glasses and gloves (just in case the bottle breaks)
1/2″ glass drill bit
masking tape
short strand of Christmas lights (with a plug only on one end)
How to:
1. Rinse out your wine bottle and remove the labels (if desired).
2. Place a piece of masking tape on the bottle where you want to drill the hole for the cord. The tape keeps the drill bit from slipping.
3. Put on your gloves and goggles and start drilling. Don’t apply too much pressure or you could break the glass. The drilling takes a long time. I spent about 30 minutes drilling the hole. Be patient!
4. Once your hole is drilled rinse the glass shavings out of your bottle, and let the bottle dry.
5. Carefully feed the strand of Christmas lights into the hole you drilled.
6. TaaDaa!
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that is so awesome!!!!!!! I love it!!!!
thats flippin sweet
looks GREAT! I love it! A whole bunch of them would look so great outside in the snow for a Christmas party.
seems like it could be a fire hazard if you leave it on for too long…
My buddy Fred does this for people as a hobby! What are the odds? xD
Pretty sure all that heat is going to make for a great fire hazard. Maybe use a strand of LED lights, please?
I’ve had the light on for about 4-5 hours at a time and the bottle only gets a little bit warm, so I don’t think it’s a fire hazard. But you’re right Josh, LED lights would probably be better!
Heat…. Really? Those things don’t generate enough heat to start a fire if you wrapped the bottle in a blanket of dried grass and drenched it in gasoline.
A person’s favorite colored liquor bottle also works great too. They are great for host/hostess gifts.
Wow, that’s amazing ^^
i’ve always wanted to do something like this with a coke bottle
looks like vacuum tube…
I would suggest drilling the hole with the drill site just bellow the water line in something like the sink. The water will act as a lubricant and prevent the splitting and chipping you can see around the edges of the hole.
Great idea though. Thank you!
Friend of mine gave me one of these 3 years ago. It had a strand of only 25 lights in it, not 50. I had it plugged in pretty much every single night for 4 or 5 hours and it only ever got slightly warm to the touch. I loved it. Unfortunately the light strand died this year and I haven’t found a replacement string with a plug at only one end. My friend made several of these, and they look best in amber or blue bottles. Same technique works with glass blocks you can get at Home Depot too.
@ marc
Though you may get electrocuted !
If you have a few wine bottles, you could drill two holes in them. Then depending on the length of the light strand, you don’t have to fill one bottle with all the lights, but distribute them across the few bottles.
I’m remodeling my kitchen and was looking for alternatives to hiding lights under the wall cabinets. This may be just the thing!
RE:ClubFerndale says:
November 29, 2009 at 3:24 am
Friend of mine gave me one of these 3 years ago. It had a strand of only 25 lights in it, not 50. I had it plugged in pretty much every single night for 4 or 5 hours and it only ever got slightly warm to the touch. I loved it. Unfortunately the light strand died this year and I haven’t found a replacement string with a plug at only one end. My friend made several of these, and they look best in amber or blue bottles. Same technique works with glass blocks you can get at Home Depot too.
All you have to do is cut the plug off strip the wires about an inch down and twist them together make sure that you wrap them in electrical tape though
These are awesome! Anyone know where to buy cheap Christmas lights online? maybe some LED ones?
Sounds like a neat little project. My ony concern would be the sharp edge of the glass where youdrill the hole cutting into the cord of the lights.
A few layers of electrical tape around the cord would work great.
I ended up making one of these last night using some old lights I had around, and unfortunately….it gets really, really hot. I’m gonna see if I can find some different lights and try again.
Folks, take a look at this.
http://www.videojug.com/film/how-to-make-a-cool-blue-led-light
Wow awesome little project, definitely doing to do this with all my left over bottles (trust me I have plenty). Going to make the house a little more festive, also try this with different colored bottles and lights to get a rainbow of colors!
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This is amazing. I’m gonna scatter these all over my room. Thanks for posting!
Great project! However for drilling the glass I would suggest first using a pilot hole (drilling a hole with with a much smaller bit to “guide” larger bits) and then working your way up in size of bits till you reach your desired size.
I used to do the same thing, only using a glass vase and without drilling any holes.
It’s a bit of a firehazard though, especially if many lamps break. It gets quite hot.
you want one of these on the hole to stop it cutting into the wires – http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=29915 and LED lights so they dont get too hot in the confined space… thanks for a great idea
You might try in the future fulling the bottle also with broken glass or mirror bits and using fewer lights. The effect is really dramatic.
I found this through Stumble and that wine bottle is one of the prettiest things I’ve ever seen. Definitely checking out the rest of your blog!
walmart has Led lights for about 6 bucks in the Christmas stuff!!
I’m going to try this fantastic idea with solar christmas lights (coming from Australia – this will work beautifully esp since our Christmas is in Summer) …. and possibly set them up through out the garden. No fire hazard then (something we really do have to worry about here). Love your site.
simple, yet cool.
i’m gonna try this.
YOU MUST MAKE SURE YOU ARE CAREFUL WITH THE GLASS DRILL BIT AND DEBRIS. the small bits of glass can easily travel around your house and if ingested will cause serious serious damage. my advice is to put water in the wine bottle while you drill and drill with the bottle in a small pan or something like that with water in it.
Aww this is very creative Could be great for the ole classic bottles to be used again …I luv this gona try out
This is not tough..But have to work on..Will try..
Just tried this with a string of 100 lights. no hole drilled, just used my fingers and a chop stick to thread the lights in from the top. i got most of them in, and the bottle got really hot. i pulled a bunch more out. there’s maybe ~40 in there now and i’m still kind of worried. Definitely keep an eye on these guys, or, as others have suggested, get your hands on some LED lights.
==========SAFETY TIP!==========
Drilling glass can cause a lot of FINE GLASS DUST to be created. When drilling glass make sure that you wear a breathing mask and work in a well ventilated area. Glass dust can get into your lungs and cause severe respiratory problems.
so gorgeous. I cannot wait to make my own–thank you so much.
Not only is this gorgeous but its functional too! When you don’t need the lights anymore it transforms into a bong!
Great idea, well executed!
Gonna make it myself too, already got a 35 lamp string, now I need a glass drill (cannot buy it at the regular hardware store here) and e bottle of wine
Love it, could be a great commercial success if you marketed it for next Christmas!
Great decorative idea. Reuse and recycle.
re: ClubFerndale
WalMart sells the strands with the plug on only one side. The only place I’ve ever seen them.
Ok, so stupid me got the hole drilled to what I thought was big enough, started to modify the lights I had with a female end on it – stupidly pigtied both ends together, blew the fuse in the other end, replaced the male part on the other end, got the pigtails separated on the other end. As I began to feed them through the hole, I realized the hole wasn’t big enough and began to drill again. Wine bottle broke.
We go through some wine around here, and I’ll give it a try again tomorrow.
I shan’t give up!
If worried about over heating why cant you just drill a few more holes in the bottle?
I would suggst using LED xmas lights, they will give off less heat and won’t be a fire hazard.
I’m going to try and do this, but with a strand of 15 lights on brown wire that I purchased at a craft store. I think it will be beautiful. Thanks for the great idea!
Has anybody tried this with a drill press. I think it would be easier but I don’t know.
I have a friend who does this with architectural glass blocks. Her creations produced heat and smoke when the lights were crammed inside with no place for the heat to escape. She drilled two extremely large holes, and it is no longer a problem.
So. these lights seemed to have bypassed that problem altogether with two holes: one for feeding the lights into, and the large one at the mouth of the bottle, for the heat to escape. Problem solved.
I just made one tonight, it came out great! Drilling threw glass is not as hard as everyone says it is, i did it right on my first try.
How much does the glass drill bit run in price? Also, I have heard of using a class cutter that can be found at craft stores…what do you think would work best??