Perrotine lampshades are made almost entirely by hand, from vintage silks and cottons sourced from India.
Softly gathered at top, and more precisely pleated at the bottom, they strike a good balance between relaxed and formal, but are always polished with their tailored cotton lining and silk or ribbon trim. Underpinning the fabric is an ivory cotton ribbon, and 100% silk thread, on higher gauge wire frames with brass finish fittings.
saris
Apart from wearing them, I am not sure there’s a more perfect way to give new life to vintage saris than by making them up into lampshades.
Setting aside the beautiful designs and how wonderfully they drape, saris have a real practical appeal for gathered lampshades, which require a length of fabric equal to between 6 and 8 times the bottom diameter of the frame, up to 5 continuous yards for the largest. Because the pattern is printed across the length of the fabric, often with a pretty border detail at top and bottom, a sari’s design is in perfect alignment with how the fabric will be cut to make a lampshade — the pattern reads as it should, up and down, and a long border can be included. This is true of other fabrics meant to be draped and wrapped around the body — batik sarongs are another good example, but there are practical limitations to using them, even though they make for terrific looking lampshades.
A sari measures approximately 44 x 180″, plus another yard or so of more decoratively patterned attached fabric called the pallu, which is the right size for sconce lampshades. The central, patterned body of the sari might yield two pairs of lampshades, making them, in a way, limited editions. This is especially true considering that I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve ever happened upon the same sari twice.
These are silks and cottons that have been softened and mellowed from time and use. The colors are a bit faded and they drape beautifully, without any of the stiffness of new textiles.
They can however also present irregularities and blemishes, and while every effort is made to be sure that the fabric is pristine, or as close to it as can be expected, a tiny hole or stain might be strategically tucked into a fold, so that it disappears.
If you love the singular richness and utility of vintage textiles, or really just about anything with a previous life, you will understand. And if you don’t, these might not be for you.
Several hours of handwork go into each lampshade: measuring, cutting, pinning, gathering and stitching.
1.
wrap top and bottom rings of a wire frame with cotton tape
2.
gather the top of the fabric and stitch to the top ring
3.
pleat, pin and stitch the bottom of the fabric to the bottom ring
4.
cut an arc of linen to fit, run a seam, press and stitch to inside of the frame
5.
stitch linen to cover each spoke of the fitting, and stitch or glue trim
