Hello my name is Carolyn Schultz and today I’d like to show you some creative ways of using chain. I want to show you how with beautiful chain gorgeous beads and a few easy techniques. You can make some amazing jewellery. Charm bracelets are so fashionable and such fun to wear, these bracelets can sell for quite a lot of money but why miss the fun and sense of achievement that is yours if you make it yourself.
Here's what we will need, a choice of assorted glass pearls, fancy chain, head pins, jump rings and a clasp. The tools I’ll be using are nylon jaw pliers, bent nose pliers, chain nose pliers, round nose pliers and wire cutters. To start I'm going to make the bead charms. This is a finished bead charm, as you can see the bead has a loop at the top which allows it to be attached to the chain bracelet.
To start I'm going to show you how to make a simple loop, first take a head pin and thread on your bead with chain nose pliers. Position the very tip around the head pin close to where it protrudes above the bead. Bend the head pin at a right angle as close to the bead as possible, so now you have a bead with a wire arm extending out to one side. Because we're using a smallish bead there's a lot of excess wire so we're going to take some wire cutters and trim our wire arm leaving about one centimetre, just enough to make a nice loop.
While holding the bead in my left hand I grab the wire arm right at its tip with round nose pliers and roll the wire back on itself to create a loop that's cantered over the top of the bead. Sometimes the hole of a bead is too large in which case we can add a small bead before making our loop. You ready-made bracelets are sold in different sizes usually between seven and eight inches. One of the benefits of making your own jewellery is that you can tailor it to fit you perfectly.
Once you've measured your wrists or decided what size of bracelet you wish to make you measure the chain - the size of the clasp usually about two and a half centimetres. The easiest way to get the length of chain you need is to open the link of chain and you can do that by twisting it open the same way that you do a jump ring. All you need to do to turn the length of chain into a bracelet is to add a clasp. Here I'm adding the clasp with a jump ring.
To open a jump ring correctly, hold the jump ring with the join at the top with your pliers and then twist it open. Attach the clasp and twist the jump ring closed. A useful tool I like to have when working with chain is called a third arm or hand. We all need a third hand sometimes and it even has a magnifying glass if needed. The chain bracelet can easily be held by the clips, leaving me to attach the bead charms with jump rings.
Once again I hold the left side of the jump ring with the chain nose pliers in my left hand and the right side of the jump ring with the chain nose pliers in my right hand, I then open the jump ring by twisting the right side of the jump ring towards me. Scoop up the bead charm by the loop at the top and attach to one of the chain lengths of the bracelet and then close the jump ring.
To close the jump ring, hold it as you did to open it and close it by twisting it back into position. You can see how helpful it is to have the third arm to hold the chain while attaching the charms. If you don't have a third arm it's still easy to attach the charms, it's just a little more time-consuming. Here you can see our finished bracelet, the gorgeous colours in the glass pearl assortments blend beautifully together.
This is our cappuccino assortment of glass pearls, you could also use our other colour assortment such as our pink blossom, which is an assortment of shades of pink and cream. Here is our charcoal assortment with shades of grey and black. Finally, our pure assortment with shades of cream and white. A nice extra when making charms is to use decorative headpins. Here are some of the decorative headpins that we have and here's how they look when beads have been added. Another nice touch is adding bead caps. Here are some of our bead caps and how they look when added to the charms. Here are some other finished samples using the same techniques covered in this video, Caryn's wonderful birthday kit is available to buy today at Bijou by mikoto UK
Here's what we will need, a choice of assorted glass pearls, fancy chain, head pins, jump rings and a clasp. The tools I’ll be using are nylon jaw pliers, bent nose pliers, chain nose pliers, round nose pliers and wire cutters. To start I'm going to make the bead charms. This is a finished bead charm, as you can see the bead has a loop at the top which allows it to be attached to the chain bracelet.
To start I'm going to show you how to make a simple loop, first take a head pin and thread on your bead with chain nose pliers. Position the very tip around the head pin close to where it protrudes above the bead. Bend the head pin at a right angle as close to the bead as possible, so now you have a bead with a wire arm extending out to one side. Because we're using a smallish bead there's a lot of excess wire so we're going to take some wire cutters and trim our wire arm leaving about one centimetre, just enough to make a nice loop.
While holding the bead in my left hand I grab the wire arm right at its tip with round nose pliers and roll the wire back on itself to create a loop that's cantered over the top of the bead. Sometimes the hole of a bead is too large in which case we can add a small bead before making our loop. You ready-made bracelets are sold in different sizes usually between seven and eight inches. One of the benefits of making your own jewellery is that you can tailor it to fit you perfectly.
Once you've measured your wrists or decided what size of bracelet you wish to make you measure the chain - the size of the clasp usually about two and a half centimetres. The easiest way to get the length of chain you need is to open the link of chain and you can do that by twisting it open the same way that you do a jump ring. All you need to do to turn the length of chain into a bracelet is to add a clasp. Here I'm adding the clasp with a jump ring.
To open a jump ring correctly, hold the jump ring with the join at the top with your pliers and then twist it open. Attach the clasp and twist the jump ring closed. A useful tool I like to have when working with chain is called a third arm or hand. We all need a third hand sometimes and it even has a magnifying glass if needed. The chain bracelet can easily be held by the clips, leaving me to attach the bead charms with jump rings.
Once again I hold the left side of the jump ring with the chain nose pliers in my left hand and the right side of the jump ring with the chain nose pliers in my right hand, I then open the jump ring by twisting the right side of the jump ring towards me. Scoop up the bead charm by the loop at the top and attach to one of the chain lengths of the bracelet and then close the jump ring.
To close the jump ring, hold it as you did to open it and close it by twisting it back into position. You can see how helpful it is to have the third arm to hold the chain while attaching the charms. If you don't have a third arm it's still easy to attach the charms, it's just a little more time-consuming. Here you can see our finished bracelet, the gorgeous colours in the glass pearl assortments blend beautifully together.
This is our cappuccino assortment of glass pearls, you could also use our other colour assortment such as our pink blossom, which is an assortment of shades of pink and cream. Here is our charcoal assortment with shades of grey and black. Finally, our pure assortment with shades of cream and white. A nice extra when making charms is to use decorative headpins. Here are some of the decorative headpins that we have and here's how they look when beads have been added. Another nice touch is adding bead caps. Here are some of our bead caps and how they look when added to the charms. Here are some other finished samples using the same techniques covered in this video, Caryn's wonderful birthday kit is available to buy today at Bijou by mikoto UK