Aiglettes are a great way to give a renaissance costume a very finished look (and keep your points from flopping about and untying). But why would you possibly want a removable aiglette? Laundry. It’s nice to be able to take all the metal bits off before things go into the wash…
This is a pretty great Intro to Jewelry project. In addition to being laundry friendly aiglettes, these little charms good for a bunch of things: they’ll clip on to wineglass charms, work as knit/crochet stitch holders, clip on to hair braids and wraps, really, the possibilities of something this simple are limitless.
What You’ll Learn
How to mount beads on Nailheads
How to use Jump Rings
A bit about Pliers
Supplies
Clockwise, from upper left: Lobster Claws, Jump Rings, Nailheads, Beads, Long Pliers, Cutting Pliers, Rounded Pliers
Lobster Claws – a type of jewelry fastener
Jump Rings – used for connecting parts of jewelry
Nailheads – used for mounting beads so they dangle
Beads – the shiny bits
Needle nose pliers – used for manipulating jump rings
Cutting pliers – these have a sharpened edge for cutting wire
Rounded pliers – used for bending straight wire into rings
All of these items should be available in the jewelry section of an adequately stocked craft store. If you can’t find needle nose pliers, you can generally open and close jump rings with your fingers.
How To:
Start with a Nailhead and a Bead. The flat head of the Nailhead will keep the bead in place.Thread the Bead onto the Nailhead.Grasp the Nailhead, above the Bead, with your Rounded Pliers. Bend the Nailhead around the Pliers.Continue bending the Nailhead around the Pliers until you've formed a complete loop. You will have to adjust how the pliers hold the wire several times.Using the Cutting Pliers, snip off any remaining straight portion of the Nailhead.You now have a little bead charm that will dangle off a jump ring. If you like, you could thread a ribbon through the metal loop and make it into a quickie aiglette, but you'd have to untie it every time you needed to do wash. How annoying!This is a Lobster Claw fastener. They're usually used on Necklaces and Bracelets. Get rid of the little metal tag it's clipped on to - that's only for when you're using the Lobster Claw to complete a circle (ie, necklace or bracelet).We'll use the Jump Ring (middle) to connect the Lobster Claw and the bead charm.Find the split in the Jump Ring. Using the Needle Nose Pliers, grasp the Ring right next to the join as shown.By pushing down on the free side of the Ring while it's in the Pliers, you can bend it slightly open.Thread the little ring at the back end of the Lobster Claw and the metal loop of the bead charm onto the Jump Ring. Using the Needle Nose Pliers as before, bend the Jump Ring shut.A completed charm. The Lobster Claw allows you to clip it to a loop sewn in to the end of a ribbon as a laundry-friendly (ie, removable) aiglette, to your knitting or crochet, or to pretty much anything else!They make up pretty quick - this batch took about 20 minutes, including cleanup.
