Wire wrapped crystal earrings tutorial free. DIY Wire and Crystal Earrings. How to make crystal wire earrings – step by step instructions for beginners.
Today we will make wire wrapped crystal earrings.
To make the earrings we will need:
Table of Contents
Step 1. Quartz crystals.
To make the earrings we will need two quartz crystals. These crystals should be with holes. The crystals should be small, about 20 x 4 mm. We have already used such crystals with holes to make a copper wire pendant in the previous master class.
Step 2. Copper wire
We will use natural soft copper wire with a thickness of 0.8 mm for the base and 0.3 mm for the weaving. The wire is thin, you will need some skills to work with this wire.
You can use any copper wire that is 1mm thick for the base and 0.4mm thick for the weaving. Please note, these earrings will be larger and heavier.
Why do I use natural copper wire? I like to patinate and polish the wire. I like to make vintage jewelry. That is why I very often use only natural wire.
You can use any wire you have available for your earrings.
Step 3. Tools for making wire wrapped crystal earrings.
We will need a small set of hand tools.
I highly recommend buying and using nylon tipped pliers. This is a very useful tool for wire weaving. I can’t even imagine making jewelry out of wire and stones without this tool.
Step 4. Wire wrapped crystal earrings tutorial – Weaving.
You can use the weaving methods that are shown in this lesson. In order to make wire wrapped crystal earrings, we will weave the two main wires with thin wire in two simple ways.
You can see other weaving methods in my free “Free wire basic weaving course”.
Step 5. Wire wrapped crystal earrings tutorial free – step by step instructions for beginners.
In order to make one wire wrapped crystal earring, we will need two pieces of natural copper wire, 0.8 mm thick, about 30 cm long each. We will also need one quartz crystal with a hole. I have a 0.8 mm wire that perfectly goes through the hole in the crystal.
If you don’t have the wire matching the hole of the pendant, then use the method of attaching the crystal with thin wire. I told you about it in the previous lesson – Wire wrapped crystal pendant.
You will need about 3-4 meters of thin wire. If you suddenly do not have enough wire (ran out), you can always add a thin wire in the process. In my tutorials, I often show you how to add more wire when you run out of it.
Slide the wire through the hole in the crystal. Place the crystal in the middle of the wire.
Bend the second wire in the middle and make it the shape of the crystal so that the wires are positioned in the same plane.
Take the thin wire in the middle. Start weaving the two thick wires to one side and the other side.
Use any method of weaving the wire.
Beforehand, draw a circle on a piece of paper. Draw the size of earrings you need. Use this drawing to bend the weaved wire.
First one side, then the other.
Connect the weavings at the top. And then, fasten them together. Use the same thin wire that you used for weaving earlier.
Next, in order to make our wire wrapped crystal earrings even more beautiful, change the way of weaving to any other way and weave both sides. First, fold the one weaving from the front side down to the crystal.
Fasten the weaving to the bottom one with a thin wire. Then bend as shown in the photo or create your own pattern.
With the red arrow, I have indicated the attachment points to the bottom weaving. We make these curls not only to make our wire wrapped crystal earrings prettier. We need them to firmly fix the crystal so that it doesn’t move and the whole piece of jewelry is solid.
Cut the excess wires and bend them inside, so that the ends of the wires do not stick out.
Step 6. The reverse side of the pendant.
On the other side, bend wires exactly the same and fasten the weaving.
Make a ring using thick wire (For example, I used 1.2 mm) and fasten it to our wire wrapped crystal earring.
We have successfully made a pendant. You can put a cord or chain through the ring.
If you have enough patience and want to make wire wrapped crystal earrings, then you need to make a second one. As you have noticed, we have yet made only one wire wrapped crystal earring. So, we need the second one.
Step 7. Patination and polishing of copper wire.
I like to patinate natural copper wire and then polish it. You can patinate it with special solutions. Be sure to read the instructions before buying and using a solution. Solutions are not always universal and they may not be suitable for all type of metals. Study the method of patination and follow the instructions.
After patination, I polish the wire. I use grinders with special felt tips. I also use polishing pastes.
To stop copper from darkening over time, sometimes I cover the jewelry with a special colorless varnish.
To make the wire wrapped crystal earrings, we will need ear pins. The ear pins are the necessary element for making earrings. You can choose them according to your taste. The most common of all are the ear pins with a spring. Although seemingly simple – they are very handy and versatile for assembling earrings.
I used pre-made copper ear pins. I bought them in a store. You can also make the ear pins yourself, it’s not that difficult.
Step 8. Video tutorial
Also, check out Wire wrapping pendant tutorials:
Wire wrapped tutorials PDF Valeriy Vorobev
