Made in the shade

To me, there's nothing more boring than a plain lamp shade.
I view lamp shades as one more opportunity to emphasize the theme of a room, provide color and texture and add one more decorative element.
It's easy to "accessorize" a lamp shade with a ribbon rose, antique jewels or milliner's flowers, lace, ruffled trim, beads, decoupage, you name it. Let your imagination go wild.
Shades are fairly cheap, especially the way I buy them -- at yard sales and thrift shops. Don't be afraid to spruce up a shade with a coat of paint or some stencils. Even cloth shades can be painted.
My favorite technique is to cover a lampshade with a fabric remnant, usually purchased from the remnant bin at the fabric store.
Just paint the shade with a mixture of white glue and water, wrap the fabric around it and fold it over at the edge. Use a little glue to seal the edge. Then use scissors to trim excess fabric from the top and bottom of the shade. Camouflage the edges by gluing on ribbon, lace, ruffles, an antique beaded necklace, etc...
My husband's office has a hunting and fishing theme so I took an old metal bait bucket, set a lamp inside it and then decoupaged a lampshade with antique colored engravings of fish I'd copied from the Internet. I finished it off by displaying some of his antique lures on the shade.