How to make a wire decoration. Making your own wire decoration

Now we wind a thin wire turn to turn on a 0.3 mm wire. The length should be 10 cm. We pass the end of this wire between the two braided ones and fix it. We make a slight bend and wrap the frame with this wire twice. Then we make a small bend again, approaching the upper part. We wind the rest of the wire onto the frame. Then we make a small snail from 1 mm wire. Fix it with your finger on the front left side. With the other edge of the wire we make two turns on the frame, and also make a snail.

We carry out the same process on the right, where the wound wire should again form a snail in one bend, and in the second bend. Now let's make another part. We bend the 1 mm wire in half and start weaving with a thin wire, one turn on one side. On the second side we bring the wire under the bottom, make a turn on the second wire. On the second turn we place a thin wire under them as well. This system may seem heavy. You just need to look closely at the photo of how it was done. Don’t go all the way, leave 1–1.5 cm and take a bite where there is a narrowing and clear about 1 cm of thin wire. Where the wide part of the part is, let it go down, bring it in from under the bottom and make snails. We also insert the upper part of this part from under the bottom and twist the pendant.

Now we attach the pearl beads. We attach a thin wire to the top of the last part. We put on the bead, pass this wire between the weaving of the last part. We also put on a bead and push it through the weaving. Now that all the parts are assembled, we need to polish the pendant. We will do this using a bur machine and a felt attachment. The revolutions must be small, otherwise the copper will turn black. After polishing, wash the pendant and clean it under hot water with a brush.

That's it, the pendant made from different wires and parts is ready. If you wear a chain with a pendant, it will look very beautiful. Good luck and see you soon.

DIY pendant made of copper wire - photo

Wire is a thin metal thread. Wires for electrical appliances are made from it. But craftsmen have also found use for this wonderful material. In mastering the technique of weaving wire with your own hands, patterns play an important role. This article will provide several master classes, accompanied by weaving patterns and a detailed description with photos.

Types of wire

Making hand-made items requires a lot of concentration from needlewomen. It is not without reason that they say that the master puts part of his soul into the created product. This means that any handmade item can be considered a talisman for the person for whom it is intended.

The first jewelry made of metal wire was worn by Egyptian women. And this material was made by drawing, that is, dragged between two heavy flat surfaces. This made the wire smooth.

The original purpose of the wire is to participate in electrical appliances as a conductor. Craftswomen saw many advantages in this rough material, for example, its flexibility.

The following types of wire are best for making jewelry:

• Copper;
• Brass;
• Aluminum;
• Made of galvanized iron.

Copper wire is most often used; it can be coated with various paints, which will help make your decoration very original. The advantage of copper is that it does not undergo oxidation; the product will serve you for a long time in its original form. And by combining this rough material with stones or beads, you can get an elegant and beautiful decoration.

Wireworking

Wireworking Literally translated from English as the art of wire winding. This is precisely the technique of making jewelry using this method.

Let's look at creating wire jewelry using the wireworking technique using the example of a ring and pendant.

small ring

To make a ring you will need:

• Copper wire;
• Large bead;
• Pliers;
• Round nose pliers with curved ends;
• A cylindrical object with a diameter equal to your finger.

In the photo for the master class, a special jewelry tool is used that allows you to make rings of a certain size. To begin, bite off a piece of wire 15-20 cm in length. Place the bead in its central part. Wind the wire onto the cylinder in three turns so that its tails stick out in different directions. Grasp the tail and, pulling the wire tightly, make three circular turns around the bead. Each subsequent row should be located slightly lower than the previous one.

Pull the wire tightly and make turns on each side of the ring. Using pliers, flatten the tip of the wire and press it tightly against the ring.

This should only be done from the top side, otherwise the decoration may injure your finger.

Press the loops as tightly together as possible. The elegant ring is ready.

By twisting different pieces of wire together and combining them with stones or beads, you can get products that are not much different from jewelry.

Elegant pendant

This step-by-step instruction is perfect for beginners.

To make jewelry you will need:

• 30 cm of copper wire with a cross section of 2 mm;
• 60 cm of copper wire with a cross section of 0.7 mm;
• 12 small beads;
• Pliers;
• Hammer;
• Round nose pliers;
• Ruler.

Use pliers to grab the thick wire by the very tip. Wind it in a spiral in increments of 2-3 mm, the width of the last turn is 5 mm. Bend the end of the wire into a loop. Flatten the resulting spiral using a hammer. Be careful not to damage the special coating applied to the surface of the wire. Attach a thin wire to the loop and apply turns with beads in the center of each on the last row of the spiral. Bite off the tip of the wire and flatten it with round nose pliers, press tightly to the product. A beautiful wire pendant is ready.

Wireworking techniques can also be used to make earrings and bracelets.

Beautiful combinations

Wire combined with beads and beads can make stunning pieces. A thin metal thread is used in beading technique. Products created with its help keep their shape well.

For example, these beaded trees are made using the needle technique. It consists of putting several beads on a piece of wire, and then the wire passes through the entire chain, bypassing the top bead. It is shown in detail in this diagram.

Flowers made from beads and wire look very realistic.

They are woven using various techniques. Most often this is a French technique in which products are made in small semicircular sectors.

Or using the parallel weaving technique, which is shown in the diagram.

We invite you to watch a detailed video tutorial on how to make a rose from beads.

Video on the topic of the article

In this collection of videos you can see various master classes on creating crafts and jewelry woven from wire.

A copper key will become a mysterious and original decoration that will perfectly complement an image in a steampunk or boho style, and can also be used as an interior accessory.

In order to make such a key with your own hands, we will need:

• copper wire: 2 pieces about 40 centimeters long, thick (1.2 mm in diameter) and very thin;
• a flat small bead, about a centimeter long;
• pliers;
• small vise or clamp;
• anvil (you can take any metal block, for me it’s actually a part from a dumbbell);
• hammer.

Making a key from copper wire

First we create the top part of our key. We take the thicker wire, combine the ends and bend it like a fish.

Pull the ends until the loop shrinks to about 1.5 cm in length.

Now you need to make the side loops. Holding the place where the wire crosses, draw one of the tails of the wire in a circle and tighten the loop to the desired size (about 1 cm in length).

We do the same with the second tail. I just do this with my hands, the copper wire is quite soft. But if it seems difficult, you can always help yourself by grabbing the tail with pliers.

The procedure must be repeated on both sides again, resulting in five loops. We place our workpiece on the anvil and start hammering.

You don’t need to hit too hard, the main thing is to keep the hammer level so that it doesn’t hit the edge and leave unsightly dents on the workpiece. The ends of the loops can be flattened more strongly, but where the wire crosses, it is important not to overdo it so that it does not break.
This is roughly what it should look like.

Cunning: You can beat the workpiece only on the side that will then be the wrong side. Then the front will turn out smooth and even.

We clamp the workpiece in a vice so that the ends stick out, and begin to twist them together.

We twist it to the place where the key bit will be (about 3 cm). Then we bend one of the ends at a right angle, and straighten the other down.

Having retreated about 2.5 cm, we grab the lower end with pliers and begin to bend it.

Bend it all the way and press it tighter with pliers.

Again we clamp the key in a vice, trying to press both the bent end and the twisted part.

Now we grab the end of the resulting loop with pliers and twist it, and then bend the remaining tail parallel to the second one.

We cut it to an equal length and carefully give it a rounded shape with pliers.

And again we put it on the anvil and hit it with a hammer. The very tip of the key and the beard can be flattened more, but we try not to overdo it with the rest.

All that remains is to attach the bead. Take a thin wire and cut it in half. We pass both pieces through the bead and place it in the center of the upper part of the key.

Now you need to wrap each end of a thin wire around a thick wire 2-3 times. To get rid of protruding tails, we bend the wires several times at the very base, and they break off neatly.
Ready! You can hang it on a cord or chain and wear it with pleasure.

This method can be used to make voluminous openwork wire products of various shapes, especially if the original form is divided into several volumes, which are made separately, and then all the parts are assembled together.

For example, we will make an openwork oblong bead in the shape of a spindle

We will need

thick (1 mm in diameter) and thin (0.5 mm) wire (you can try other wire sizes).

Beads, beads and other elements for decoration

Tools: curved pliers, side cutters, awl, ruler, anvil, hammer.

Knitting needle or wire with a diameter of approximately 1.5 mm;

rod or nail,

as well as auxiliary material: toilet paper and thread.

Let's first prepare a thick wire from which the frame of the bead will be made. We wind a loose spiral on the knitting needle.

Let's stretch the spiral further and beat it into a flat snake

Something like this.

Let's wind up the broken wire and heat it in the flame of a gas stove burner.

Then we put it in the water. The scale will fall off. Let's wipe off the wire. The wire will become soft again.

Now we will prepare the internal base - the “spindle”, on which we will wind the wire. To do this, you will need toilet paper - pieces torn lengthwise, as well as a metal rod and threads.

By twisting the paper into a rope, we form a “spindle”, for which we place the turns of paper on top of each other in the center of the “spindle”.

We wrap the last layer of paper like a bandage and secure it with several turns of thread.

We begin to form a bead. We wind the broken wire onto the “spindle” in a spiral, making sure that the turns are at the same distance and the wire lies on the flat side and not on the edge.

Then we apply longitudinal turns, wrapping the wire around the ends of the rod.

We carry out the initial fixing of the bead shape. To do this, we secure the intersections of the frame wire with turns of thin wire. 3 passes from one end of the bead to the other are enough. It is convenient to start winding from the middle of a piece of thin wire so that the working end is not very long, no more than 1 m.

Place the bead in a cup of water. When the paper gets wet, you need to pull out the rod and, using an awl, remove the paper and threads.

The result is a semi-finished bead.

We begin to decorate it, filling the voids with metal balls, beads, beads. When wrapping, we try to secure the intersections of the thick wire. Using an awl and curling pliers, you can adjust the shape of the bead and the distance between the turns. It is necessary to take into account that the more densely the bead is “woven”, the more rigid the structure becomes.

I got this bead. Copper balls, 2 types of beads and radonite stone chips were used. This bead, 6 cm long and with a maximum diameter of 1.5 cm, took approximately 1.5 m of thick wire with a diameter of 1 mm and 2 m of thin wire with a diameter of 0.5 mm.

Wire jewelry was made by ancient craftsmen. Initially, ancient Russian blacksmiths forged jewelry, chain mail, and weapons, and from the twelfth century they switched to the drawing method. This made it possible to simplify the process of manufacturing thin, even wire, as well as reduce prices for products made from it. The time of wire chain mail has passed, but craftsmen continue to amaze with wire products: hair jewelry, earrings, bracelets, rings, pendants, souvenirs, key rings, three-dimensional objects.

Information for beginners

Although they have been found since ancient times among different peoples, the names of the craftsmen have not survived to this day. Jewelry made from wrap, as a new type of needlework, went down in history with the name of Alexander Calder. He had a penchant for weaving wire jewelry and souvenirs since childhood, when he made earrings and bracelets for his sister, and gave his parents brass animals for Christmas.

He devoted all his activities to making jewelry, toys, and sculptures. He rarely soldered metal parts and more often used the stitching method. This method allows even novice craftsmen to create jewelry. Different types of wire are used for work (brass, silver, copper, nickel, titanium, aluminum, zinc).

Thick wire is used for the base of the product, as it holds its shape, and thin wire is used to braid wire decorations. Various stones, beads, seed beads, and glass beads can be added to the weaving. When the wire is wrapped with thread, it is already a type of needlework called ganutel.

What do you need for work?

Often, novice craftsmen make products from wire using mixed techniques, using knowledge from such areas as wire wrap, ganutel, beading, quilling, and isothread. First, a sketch is drawn, then it is disassembled into individual elements, patterns, and only then proceeds to practical production. What will a novice wireworker (that’s what a master working in the wire wrap technique is called) need:

• tool,
• all types of wire,
• decorative beads, seed beads, stones.

Weaving wire jewelry is impossible without round-nose pliers, pliers with a pointed, curved, rectangular, nylon “tip,” wire cutters, a needle file (can be replaced with sandpaper at first), anvil (flaheisen), sperak, hammer, wiggic, drawing board, crossbar.

If you are working with copper wire, you can bend it with your fingers or use pliers or other hard objects. To make a pattern from thick material or a more complex design, you need a wiggeek and a crossbar. The first tool looks like a board with many holes and pegs. Place the pegs in the desired order and wrap them with wire, creating an unusual pattern. A crossbar (a metal cone with a thickness of 9-40 mm) will be needed to create bracelets, rings, and chains. At first, the connecting parts can be made with round nose pliers.

To make your home-made wire jewelry look like store-bought ones, purchase sulfur liver. This material is used to pattern copper, bronze, silver, and brass wire products to give a touch of antiquity.

Main elements: pin and spiral

A pin is a wire with a tip, somewhat similar to a pinning needle. To make it, pinch the wire with round pliers, retreating a third from the edge (as much as is left, this will be the diameter of the ring). Rotate the wire 90 degrees. And they begin to wrap the half of the tip of the pliers, forming a ring. Then, near the base, the excess edge of the wire is bitten off, and the ring is leveled using pliers.

The spiral is a simple circle with a ring. This pattern is great for making wire and bead jewelry. Using round nose pliers, pinch the tip of the wire, making a tight circle around the tip. Next, the resulting ring is pinched between the tips and the spiral is carefully wound. The diameter of the pattern depends on the number of turns. At the last stage, pliers pinch the wire from the resulting spiral, and with the free end of the wire they form a ring, as when making a pin. Excess material is cut off with nippers.

Main elements: spring, rings, balls

The spring is used to braid the wire. Wind the wire of the required length tightly onto the crossbar. It can be used to create some individual elements, or put on a pin, creating a voluminous edging, or from braided pins to make an unusual chain for men.

Rings are used as connecting elements, especially if you weave jewelry from beads and wire. The wire is wound around the crossbar (the diameter of the rings depends on its thickness) with a tight twist, like a spring. Then it is removed and cut in the middle with wire cutters. If the space is large, use pliers or fingers to close the ring.

Balls on the edges of the wire are created by heating on a burner (some craftsmen use a regular gas burner). To obtain them, you need high burner power and “unclean” wire, as well as borax, which creates such droplets perfectly even. You can blacken the wire using liver sulfur and ammonia. The parts are flattened with a hammer, creating new elements.

Wire jewelry: master class for beginners

If you have never tried weaving wire, then you should try your hand at simple examples. To make a bracelet you will need thick and thin copper wire, pliers, wire cutters and a torch (if you are working with a whole coil of wire).

Make rings of the required diameter from thick wire. To do this, find a cylindrical template of the required diameter (pipe). Wrap the skeins with thick wire, connect them in several places with temporary staples (bend the wire to the width of the bracelet rings, cut it, put it on them and pinch the ends).

If you don’t have thick wire, you can buy ready-made cheap bracelet rings, connect them in several places for strength and start braiding. The braiding method involves twisting each bracelet ring from bottom to top and top to bottom using thin copper wire.

The weaving should go one after another; if the wire has moved away, then use pliers to move it closer. If you work with long wire, then during the weaving process it becomes stiff. Therefore, it is heated with a burner (looks like a hair dryer with a flame), and weaving continues. Since copper turns black after heating, the finished product is then treated with citric acid (water is heated, powder is added, the product is boiled for several minutes, then rinsed in an aqueous solution).

You can braid the entire bracelet with wire or attach other wire decorations in the foreground (wire wrap allows connection with stones, beads, flattened wire elements).

Make earrings for the copper bracelet. To make them you will need wire, ready-made clasps for earrings, connecting rings, decorative elements (stones, beads). Please note that the color of the jewelry should be in harmony with the clasps and wire. If so, gilded clasps with an amber stone. If the fasteners are silver, then take light-colored wire.

So, you need to make large and small rings from thick wire. Make blanks for the second earring in a mirror image at once, placing the parts next to each other. Now, with a thin wire, loosely braid the inner and outer rings. If you want to get a more voluminous look, then braid each ring with a spring (or put a spring on the ring), and then braid the products with thin wire over the spring (in this case the braid will be very even).

Next, attach the clasp to the outer ring. Place the beads and stone on the wire and attach them to the inner ring using a connecting ring. You can make the connecting elements yourself. To make it look antique, copper is blackened and varnished. They are obtained as jewelry from jewelry wire.

How to braid a stone for a pendant

It’s good when there is a bead with a hole where you can stick a wire, but if the decoration is made of stone or coin, then what to do? For such cases, a special braiding method is used. You will need round-nose pliers, thin-nose pliers, side cutters without a chamfer, wire (thickness 0.3 and 0.8 mm), stone (cabochon).

Weaving wire jewelry begins with making a frame. Wrap the cabochon with thick wire. Using thin-nose pliers, lift the wire tails up so that the angle is 90 degrees. Leave about four centimeters and cut off the excess material. From this wire you prepare many connecting rings with a diameter of 4 mm.

Cut off 1.3 meters of thin wire, leaving 50 cm, and begin to wind connecting rings to the frame. First, wrap it around the frame with 4 turns, then wrap the ring to the frame with five turns. Next, without breaking the wire, go to the ring and wrap the adjacent element with three turns, smoothly exiting onto the frame.

This is how you attach all the rings. Periodically apply the frame to the stone if it is convex and shape the position of the rings. Perhaps, when climbing, you will need to increase the rings further. Connect the last ring with the first five turns, and cut the wire from the wrong side. You twist the ends of the thick wire into a spiral (you can make completely different curls), bend the sides of the resulting pattern, forming a rhombus, and wrap it with the thin wire that you left initially.

Wrong side of the pendant

The front side of the wire decoration is ready, now make the back side. To do this, make the same circle from thick wire, but smaller. Bend the ends of the wire into a tight ring. You need to make sure that both curls fit tightly to each other. The lower part of the product can be flattened with a hammer. Just tap it slowly, slowly - hit one place, see if it’s level, then move on. Otherwise, notches will form.

Now you connect the outer frame, stone and back into a single whole. Secure several places with temporary wire so that the parts fit tightly and do not move. Thin wire now needs to be wrapped around the outer and inner frame where there are voids (between the connecting rings on the outer part).

The last step is to make a pendant loop from a braided ponytail with curls. To do this, using a steel knitting needle, carefully and slowly bend it so that the curls are located on the connecting rings of the product. Now thread the lace or ribbon. As you can see, jewelry made from copper wire is no worse than jewelry.

Please note that the stone on the jewelry is held in place by external patterns (connecting rings, curls), which are secured to each other with coils. If the wire lies loose, the cabochon will fly out.

Wire hair jewelry

You can easily make bobby pins, hairpins, and combs from wire. The simplest option is to string a bead on a wire, make a flower shape with a curl and attach it to the base. A more interesting pattern will be made from flattened wire. Then leave the end for the bead, and slowly flatten the rest of the wire, at the same time giving shape. In this example, you wrap the wire around the bead, then move on to the petals, ending with a spiral curl. Put the bead on, make sure the wires fit snugly together, and solder it to the base.

Let's take a closer look at how to make jewelry from wire, beads, and seed beads. On a piece of paper, draw a diagram of the hairpin, starting from the curl and moving to the outer circle, the end of which goes into another spiral, located above the first. It turns out to be a circle with two internal antennae. This element is done continuously. Then, at the point where the two curls touch, use a thin wire to braid them with several turns.

• there are six turns between the beads;
• there are eight turns between the small beads;
• There are ten turns between the large beads.

The distance is determined by the diameter of the decorative material. The weaving begins and ends with small beads, and in the middle there are large beads. The curls are braided only with beads. Next, make a hairpin. Fold the wire in half so that one end is a couple of centimeters longer. Attach it to the hairpin; the hairpin on each edge should be 5-7 centimeters larger. Excess material is cut off. Twist the hairpin from the middle and twist the ends into a spiral.

To make jewelry made of copper wire harmonize with the frame, thread beads into the curls (one piece at one end, braid the other with 3 beads, 5 beads). There is no need to braid the entire hairpin to prevent your hair from getting tangled. Only individual antennae and a distance of 0.6 -1 cm between them, forming a triangle.

Simple ideas for original products

Handicraft stores offer a huge assortment of various decorative elements for making jewelry. Buy a few, it will save your time and enrich your knowledge (now you will know exactly how to make connecting rings, fasteners, clamps). Such DIY prefabricated wire decorations are no different from store-bought ones (except at an affordable price).

Here is an example of how to make an ethnic decoration from square elements with round voids. From thick wire, bend a square (the corners should be straight) and a smaller circle. Place a square, a circle inside it, and braid the shapes with thin wire. Another option is to put a spring on the wire before connecting each figure, and then braid them. You will get massive decorations.

To match the necklace with earrings and bracelet, repeat the same pattern. In the example with square earrings, the necklace will be a simple one made of beads, and attach a pattern of squares in the middle. Another example of an original wire decoration (master class for a two-color bracelet):

• Divide the wire into equal pieces;
• using sewing wires, connect the light ready-made half-arcs and the dark wire in turn;
• attach fasteners to the edges;
• form the resulting line into a bracelet of several rings.

Bracelets can be made without clasps; they are simply put on your hand. The shape of a snake or arrow is most suitable for such a wire decoration (photo of a hand with bracelets).

Brief conclusions

It is better to train your hand and dexterity on copper wire when making simple hairpins, rings, and barrettes. If you don’t have specialized equipment and tools, don’t despair. Use your imagination. Instead of a burner, use a gas stove to create droplets (and you can’t do without borax, it creates a perfectly flat surface). Replace Wigjik with sleight of hand, pliers and a paper diagram. The crossbar can be replaced at the initial stages by knitting needles of different diameters.

To avoid patination of wire jewelry, use non-oxidizing wire. You can coat the decoration with varnish for durability. If you need to create a patina, wash the wire well in a lemon solution. Then place it in warm water, apply a thin layer of sulfur ointment (pharmacies sell it) on your fingers, and wash the material under water. Without removing it from the water, wash off the sulfur with regular dish soap and wipe it dry.

Or you heat the wire over a fire, and then lubricate the warm wire with baby cream and rub until the desired result is achieved, then wash it off with soap. Again, patina is an acquired taste and is created through trial and error. You can do without the antique color. Some people simply paint with gold or silver acrylic paint and varnish.

There is no exact information on how to make a wire decoration. Each master finds something of his own, talks about it in his master classes or simply offers his creation. Try your hand at simple products, practice on finished products from masters: mentally divide the decoration into its component parts and reproduce it in practice.