Wire wrapping a stone pendant. Wire wrapping pendant tutorial step by step from Valeriy Vorobev. Wire wrapping techniques for pendants.
Table of Contents
Wire for wrapping a stone.
The wire is a wonderful material, it can be used to create real miracles. However, besides the knowledge of technology and material, to create original beautiful jewelry you need a lot of inspiration and ideas. Where can you get them?
You can get inspired by nature and architecture. It is also very interesting to study the jewelry of the past, sometimes they suggest the most unexpected solutions.
As for me, I can offer you my wire jewelry designs. Use them for your training. Create your own jewelry using my works. All lessons on this site are free and they are at your complete disposal.
Copper wire is an excellent material for creating jewelry. It is soft and pliable, it is easy to give it any shape. In addition, copper can be polished and patinated. It looks well in combination with colored glass and many stones. And most importantly, copper wire is easy to find. You can buy it in craft stores.
I often use copper wire which I get from electrical wires. Using a knife, we can cut off the outer jacket of electrical cables. Thus, you can get good copper wire for crafts. This wire is even better quality than the ones I buy in special craft stores.
For the pendant, I use a natural half hard copper wire of 1 mm for the base and a soft copper wire of 0,4 mm for the weaving. I find copper wire the best material for wire wrapping a stone pendant.
Stone for a pendant
We can place many materials in the central part of wire jewelry. For example, all kinds of beads, stones of different shapes, sea glass. You can also use ready-made accessories.
Working with wire is a great opportunity to give a second life to grandmother’s beads, damaged scattered jewelry that has long been idle in your casket. You can use old buttons to make jewelry. I myself recently used metal buttons for a copper wire pendant.
I prefer to use natural stones for copper wire jewelry. I like to patinate and polish copper wire jewelry. Therefore, there is a risk of damaging the beads or cabochons of unstable materials. I am quite satisfied with natural stones in terms of their characteristics. Besides, there are a lot of stones of different shapes and colors. You can buy natural stones with holes or without them. You can use your imagination for wire wrapping a stone pendant.
Today I will use agate cabochon, which is the shape of an oval.
Wire wrapping tools.
For our work, we will need a minimum set of hand tools.
I strongly recommend buying silicone tipped pliers if you don’t have them. This is an indispensable tool for working with wire.
Wire wrapping a stone pendant tutorial
We will need four pieces of 1mm wire about 30-40 cm long each. You should always have enough thin 0.4 mm wire. This type of wire is the most important in wire wrapping a stone pendant.
First of all, we need to measure the cabochon. To do this we can use a strip of paper. Wrap it around the cabochon. Make marks on the paper with a marker.
The paper strip will be our measure for creating the weaving. The four wires will need to be weaved together. But this has to be done beautifully.
You may not understand everything right away. Perhaps this design is not suitable for beginners. Although, who knows what beginners are capable of. Let’s move on.
I tried to take enough pictures to make it clearer.
I bent the wire to attach the cabochon while making a weaving.
According to the measurements you need to make a weaving and evenly distribute mounts for the cabochon on the front and back sides.
The result should look like the photo below. Bend the weaving exactly in the middle and make the shape similar to the cabochon. I carefully used pliers to bend the weaving.
Next, bend the weaving to the shape of the cabochon. The cabochon will be fixed and will not fall out.
Sew the weavings together with the same thin wire from which you made the weaving.
Distribute the wire in pairs and start weaving them together in any weaving type. You can learn the types of weaving in my free course. Use the course as a reference.
I did not weave the two wires together. We will use them separately from the weaving.
You can repeat my design or create your own. The most important thing is that we have just fixed the cabochon beautifully without a hole. And what’s most important – we didn’t use soldering.
Usually, I bend these weavings of two wires by hand and do not use tools. You can help yourself with rubber tipped pliers. But do it carefully.
Usually, I use long pieces of wire to work with, because it is very easy to cut off the extra wire. It is much worse when there is not enough wire to complete the pendant. For this pendant, I used wire pieces about 50 cm long. That is why I have such long wire leftovers. I advise you to use my tips – they are really important in wire wrapping a stone pendant.
Make a loop for a cord or chain from one weaved pair.
Beautifully bring all the ends to the back of the pendant. And just nicely cut off the excess wire and nicely bend the ends of the wires.
Patination and polishing of copper wire.
To make the copper wire and stone pendant look noble and ancient, it can be patinated. Various substances available at home can be used for patination. In stores, you can buy special solutions for patinating copper. Be sure to read the instructions for these solutions.
Very often I use an aqueous solution of ammonia for copper patination. In our country, you can buy it freely in the pharmacy. Ammonia solution is sold in small glass bottles.
Use ammonia carefully!
I pour the solution into a glass jar with a lid. I hang (make a hole in the lid beforehand) a pendant on a wire over the ammonia solution. After a while, the copper begins to darken. When the copper gets the color I want, I take the pendant out of the jar.
Next, I polish the wire. I use a grinder with felt tips. I use a polishing paste for polishing, which can also be bought at the store.
After polishing I wash a pendant under running water with liquid soap. I also use a brush for this (to be exact, I use a toothbrush). Then, dry the product. So that copper does not darken over time it can be coated with a special colorless varnish. Now, you are fully familiar with wire wrapping a stone pendant.
The pendant made of copper wire and stone cabochon is ready. It can be worn, given as a gift or sold. Hope you enjoy not only the end result (the pendant) but also the very process of working with the wire.
Good luck on your creative journeys!
Video tutorial
Also, check out Wire wrapping pendant tutorials:
Wire wrapped tutorials PDF Valeriy Vorobev
