Stained glass as a ceiling would work if you stick with a pattern that works with the room.
I will assume that your basement is a “rompus room” or “game room” where perhaps you have a card table and a pool table. I doubt that this room is a formal dining room or a parlor.
Assuming you have two areas (pool table and card table), I would select a group of panels over these two focal points. Over the Pool table would be a 2x2 area of panels – each panel is or should be 4 feet by 2 feet, the over all area would be 4 feet by 8 feet.
Over the Card table I would select either two panels side by side (4 feet by 4 feet) or 3 panels side by side (6 feet by 4 feet) Assuming your regular card table that may be the 4x4.
Individual stained glass panels set apart would look cheesy especially if you do not match the patterns. Try to keep it to one or two center pieces of “glass”. The pattern should incorporate or complement the Grid of the frame. May I suggest Frank Lloyd Wright feeling:
http://www.arthurstern.com/ it has a lot of straight lines and would complement the grid of the ceiling.
As for clear panels to set the stained glass on, I would go for the diamond bead (used in florescent fixtures)
http://www.doityourself.com/store/4476099.htm which would diffuse the light and give it a more even appearance. Diamond bead has a smooth surface and a beaded surface, the stick on stained glass would go on the smooth surface (down). I would run the string lights along the frame not directly on or over the "glass" panels themselves. The string would be hidden by the frame, the light would radiate upward and to the sides.
Above the lit areas I would paint the area bright white (to reflect light downward. Unless there are bare beams and joists underneath, then I would use luan (1/4 -1/8 inch thick plywood) to make a flat surface above the panel to remove the shadows that will be seen even through stained glass from the light bouncing off the hard ceiling/joists above.
I do not know how much room is up there to work with.
The down side is that the large panels may not be well lit at the center. An Alternative is to divide your “glass” panel with wider strips of faux lead and run the lights along that. As example, running a ½ to ¾ inch wide strip of “lead” to make a divided light of smaller grids within the grid. This may work best with the liquid stained glass:
http://drakencastle.tripod.com/stainedglassinfo.html For more reflectivity there is spray paint that comes in “chrome” and “silver” added interest or to give a different glow to the light would be to use Gold and Silver, spraying the surface in a mottled pattern. The light will reflect in soft tones of gold and silver combining to make a late day sunlight effect.
Let’s say you are going to center the stained glass in the middle of the room, the treatment from there out to the walls would be your “frame” you would treat it as such, selecting a color or texture or even that foam trim material to make a “frame”. The foam material is found at any home store and comes in a wide variety of patterns, easily cut, very light and can be attached to the ceiling with Velcro, or glued into place permanently. Framing out the stained glass would decrease the “cheesy” look.
There are a couple of options when it comes to string light. Your Rope light which is tiny bulbs set in a clear or colored rubber hose or your Christmas String lights. Now days we have the option of using LED lights. A Rope light may not provide enough light to span the distances between panels. I would suggest LED light strings, spacing the distance between the lights closer than pulling the string out full.
http://www.birddogdistributing.com/product_info.php?cPa...6_46&products_id=133 Upside they last for a long time, down side is the initial out lay price – however they use far less electricity, produce far less heat. LED lights are brighter than the bulb type lights. On our front porch we used to use 2 sets of incandescent mini-lights to light the area brightly, now days we used only one set of LED to accomplish the same brightness. Also the prices during the Winter holiday season drops dramatically for these lights. Further the tops of the individual LED is magnifying in its shape, thus a tight “beam” of light shines out of that. You can use this to your advantage by pointing the light upward to reflect more light off the upper ceiling.
A problem that would arise from this is evenly spacing the lights and keeping the lights in a tight row. I would suggest getting lathing strips – these are strips of wood a fraction of an inch thick coming in a variety of widths. I would use a low heat “hot glue” to stick each individual light to the lathing strip. Once assembled on a table, the lathing strip can be set above on the frame with relative ease and using Velcro to keep it in place and standing up right (lights pointed upward).
Also providing electricity to a number of strings may become and issue rapidly, considering that one can only string together 3 strings in series, you may have to have a number of outlets to do a whole room.
I would attempt to keep the number of panels done this way to either 4 quarters of a full. Either 2x2 or 4 side by side.
I would urge that you experiment first, do one panel stringing light around it and see how well lit it becomes.
Other suggests would be to cover those luan pieces with Aluminum foil to increase the amount of light coming back down.
Speaking of Luan, this plywood is relatively cheap, has a very nice smooth side (It is used in furniture construction to back pieces like shelves) takes to stain and finishing, is easily cut. You could replace the whole ceiling with a nicely stained and glossed ceiling with the panels of stained glass – saving the drop ceiling panels for future owners or for a time when you want to return the room to that ceiling. Luan is easy to work with, it can be padded and covered with material, it can be primed and then have fabric or wall paper glued to it. It is light weight, accepts paint very well.
