If you've dropped every last dime on a gift for your honey on Valentine's Day, you'll probably be too broke to justify any fun home tech splurges—like that gorgeous lamp that would look great in your living room. But you can afford to spice up the lamp you have with a little bit of felt.

We spotted an Ikea Hack where one creative soul took a white Ikea Samtid floor lamp and beat the boring out of it with an orange felt wrap. A length of felt is secured with buttons on the back seam for color, texture and a whole lot more visual interest.

But then we spotted two more easy & cheap felt projects that will wake up a boring shade:

• At Design Sponge, two Ikea Melodi pendant lamps get a soft makeover with nothing more than coffee-cup sized felt circles. Glue them on flat or fold them for extra frills.


• Then we spotted a Myles-of-Style-inspired project at Apartment Therapy Chicago that uses stripes of felt instead of circles to add interest to a wide circle shade. After tacking the strips horizontally across the lamp, use wooden dowels to create 'bumps' in the stripes. We love the way it looks with neutral strips on a colored shade.