Jewelry Blog

Loops are a very important elements in most wire designs. With these Gypsy Wire and Bead Earrings, you can dangle beads from five of the loops for a fun gypsy look. This design can either be done using a jig or by hand using round nosed pliers.

You’ll need the following tools and supplies:

12 inches of 18 or 20-gauge round wire
4 inches of chain
2 ear hooks
10 head pins
Your choice of beads
Ruler
Wire cutters
Jeweler’s files
Round-nosed pliers
Nylon-nosed pliers
Chain-nosed pliers

I’m using copper chain and gold-tone findings in this tutorial, but you could use any type of metals, mixed or matched.

Developing and using patterns is an important element when designing jewelry. It doesn’t matter what kind of jewelry you are talking about, but this is especially true when it comes to any type of jewelry that involved beads.

Beadwork magazine has a challenge out to its readers to create unique jewelry patterns. The deadline is early August and the idea is to take a pattern that already exists, like something from nature or piece of fabric, and use that as the design inspiration for your jewelry piece. Winners will have their jewelry work featured in the late August issue of Beadwork magazine. For all the details and rules, go to the Beading Daily weblog.