The Classic Lamp Shade Fruit Cover Upcycle Just Got A Collapsible Upgrade

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

Few things are more annoying than a swarm of flies hovering around your food during a picnic. Covering your food is an option, but plastic food carriers look bulky, and most of them don't have the height to cover tall serving trays. However, a mesh covering like the DIY lampshade bug net House Digest featured in a January 2025 article works wonders. Now it's time to introduce food cover bug tent 2.0. This iteration, which comes care of Instagrammer @sustainablyamber, features the same basic design, except for one new feature. It's collapsible, making it easy to carry around from cookout to cookout. 

Let's start with a thrifted lamp. You want to look specifically for a lamp whose shade collapses down like an accordion. A swath of white garden netting provides it with cover, while a needle and thread ensure that the netting gets sewn onto the frame of the lamp. Same goes for the ribbon you'll secure to the bottom of the shade's frame to add a bit of fun. An old wine cork is as charming as it is practical when you make it the cover's knob.

Next, you'll want to grab a few wooden clothespins to keep everything in place while you make over the vintage lamp. You'll also need a long screw and a wide washer. Finally, some soap, water, a dishwashing scratchpad, and a dishcloth to dry it with allow you to clean up the lamp's frame so that it looks good as new.

The shade will have to be removed from the frame and the frame will need to be scrubbed with soap and water so that it can be near food. Let it dry, then drape the mesh over the frame while it's in its full un-collapsed form. Make sure that the net covers the whole frame. It should fall a couple of inches past the bottom part of the lampshade. You'll be sewing a hem in the fabric around the bottom of the shade, so you need some extra material to work with.

Once you have the fabric draped on the frame properly, sew a hem in the bottom of the mesh. Then sew on the ribbon trim. This is a good opportunity to repurpose some ribbon if you have it. You'll also need to add a few stitches to mesh at the top of the frame, because you don't want the fabric to separate from the frame once you collapse it. A long screw with a wide washer needs to be pushed through the top hole in the lampshade. Once that's secure, twist the wine cork onto the screw to create the piece's knob.

A tip: Try using some white tulle fabric or even some insect barrier netting from the Agfabric Store. Whatever fabric you decide upon, make sure that it has small holes. Persistent small bugs can weasel their way into some types of netting if the holes are too big. 

With the ribbon trim on the bottom, this is already going to be a pretty project. However, you can take some steps to give it more of a foodie theme, and most of them are pretty simple. Start by swapping out the standard ribbon you have on the bottom of the shade and replacing it with burlap leaf-shaped ribbon by the Naidiler Store. This type of ribbon isn't as wide as other types of decorative ribbon, so you may have to sew a wider piece of ribbon around the hem and then sew the leaf ribbon on top of the wide ribbon. The leaf ribbon will be the second layer.

Next, get a hold of some food-shaped clothing patches. The strawberry-themed iron-on patches by Kirako Store would look cute for these purposes. Sew the patches onto the mesh in a free-flowing pattern. Next, sew some of the leaf ribbon on the mesh, using it to connect the strawberry patches together, as live strawberry vines would on a real plant. You can add some additional vines on the mesh to create the impression of vines around the strawberries. Finally, you're not limited to strawberry-themed patches here. Lots of foodie-themed patches exist, including sushi, pizza, candy, and more. Pick the patches that represent your favorite foods and sew them onto the cover to create an adorable decoration.