Making jewellery is one of the most fun crafts out there but if you haven’t given it a go, it can be daunting to walk into a craft store and not know where to start! Even if you’re a jewellery expert, you’ll love these 3 easy DIY projects we found.
Time needed: an hour
Materials: pliers, gold chain, thin gold wire, gold ear wires, glass teardrop beads in your favourite colour
Step 1: Cut about a 7.5cm piece of your gold wire.
Step 2: Make a super small loop at the end, and twist the wire to hold.
Step 3: Thread on 5 of your glass teardrops. Then, make another loop at the end of the wire to finish, twist, and cut.
Time needed: an afternoon or evening
Materials: silver or gold necklace chain, 6 eye pins, 2 head pins, 3 colours of Polymer clay, needle nose pliers, cheap tile or smooth, flat, clean surface, non-serrated knife, wire cutters
Step 1: Condition the clay by simply mixing it and squishing it with your fingers. You may want to roll it into a log between your palms, fold it in half, and then roll again. The smaller the piece of clay you are conditioning, the faster it will soften up.
Step 2: Press the clay out into a flat, even pancake on the tile. Use your knife to slice off the edges into the shapes for your pendant.
Step 3: Poke holes in each of the clay pieces. Use an eye pin, a wood skewer, bead reamer or any other thin, pointy object.
Step 4: Then bake according to the clay directions – my pieces were about 5mm thick so they took 30 minutes at 135 celsius.
Step 5: To finish, assemble the pieces and attach to the chain. Use your 6 eye pins (for the top three pieces) and 2 head pins (for the bottom pieces. Insert them through the holes you’ve made and used round nose pliers to make a simple loop (find out how here) to attach them together.
Finished and it looks great!
Time needed: an hour
Materials: button collection, hot glue gun, plain rings with flat side
Step 1: Select your favourite buttons, placing the biggest first and stacking up. Be sure to choose your arrangement before you glue!
Step 2: Prepare your glue gun and glue the buttons on top of each other
Step 3: Hold in place and leave to dry
Ready to wear!
Do you make jewellery? What have you made? Or what other crafts do you enjoy? Tell us below.