Covering Crimps

When creating seed beaded loops, I was recently asked, how do you cover the crimps? There are a few options! I'm home because of a flooded basement issue today so I made good use of my morning and some shots while crafting a new necklace and earrings that feature seed beaded loops. Here are some photos.

Step 1: String your seed beads and crimp bead.



Step 2:
Thread the wire through the brass square, and pass the wire back through the crimp.
Crimp tightly with crimping pliers



Option 1:
You can easily cover the crimp with un-opened jump rings.
 

Option 2:
You can cover the crimp with a bead- has to have a large enough hole to fit over the crimp.
 

Option 3:
You can use a crimp cover which come in any metal color you like.
 

Here's a shot of one section. 
Here's where it gets tricky. 
Yes, there was swearing.

When finishing the other end, I repeated the first step, but it can be
tricky to get everything pulled tight enough so that there is room to 
crimp without pinching and breaking seed beads...

My ending crimp was not as tight as I wanted and so to
snug everything tight, I added 1 crimp cover on one side of
each beaded section  - why only one side? That was all it took to 
smoosh the beads together leaving no gaps on the wire.


I followed the same technique when making the matching earrings.
At the top, I thread the wire through a jump ring, passed the wire back
down through the crimp. and Covered the crimp with 
a crimp cover.
 

Here are the shots of the finished pieces:


Polymer clay lentils- Pam Wynn
Teal seed beads
Faceted amethyst
Brass squares- Diver
Brass ear wires- Vintaj Brass Co.

Hope this was helpful!

Comments

  1. I like this necklace and earrings! I don't remember that you've assembled anything this way before, but I think it's an extremely successful design, and the beads are gorgeous.

    I'm glad to hear that someone else turns the air blue while using crimp covers!

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  2. Thank you! That was very helpful. Thanks for sharing with us all. I am always so inspired by your work!

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  3. Wow! What a beautiful design! I always wondered how you made those loops, but was afraid to ask. Thanks SO MUCH for the tutorial!

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  4. A absolutely beautiful design. I love the metal squares. I will have to keep threefold in mind. It is too bad that you ha to deal with a flooded basement. I live in Florida, we do not have basements.. but it would suck either way.. Have a wonderful day!!

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  5. Thank for sharing the tip. I like to use buttons as clasps and slip them through a loop of seed beads, but doing this with beading thread isn't much fun -- looks like there will be some crimp covers in my future!

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  6. I've "cheated" with crimp covers too! Pretty dang handy. I always use them to cover my crimps. I also found that tiny "loop heishi", such as the ones for sale at Happy Mango Beads (they look like tiny hammered jumprings that look like tiny discs when you string them) are handy for "cheating" if you don't quite get your project strung tight enough--they are open, so I twist them open with my pliers and slip however many I need onto my beading wire to take up the slack. I loathe cutting something up and restringing! I use crimp covers to cover knots on knotted pieces too, esp. if I have used a dot of glue on the knot. The glue makes a scratchy spot I like to cover. I use the big 5mm crimp covers for that.

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  7. What a neat tutorial! Thanks so much for sharing the little trick about covering the crimp with a bead :) xoxo Beth

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  8. Thank you so much for this tutorial, Lorelei! I understood exactly what you were explaining. I will have to look into purchasing some crimp covers. I don't have any of them in my supplies. But I can certainly use the jump rings trick or find a bead that will do the job. Thanks again - it is very kind of you to share with us!

    Alesha

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  9. May I share the tutorial to my Blog? It'll be credit 100% in your name =)
    Thanks before for the useful tips.

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  10. I have "cheated" with beads and crimp covers and jump rings too. Haha Great minds think alike! How's the basement? What was it from?
    I should tell you about the time my sump pump line snapped in 1/2, it was like a wet t-shirt contest in my basement. So not pretty!

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  11. Wonderfully helpful tutorial. Thanks so much.

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  12. Fabulous! You could also tie a lovely snippet of fiber over the crimp for texture. I believe Kate McKinnon sews up a square-stitch cover for her crimps. All add a wonderful finishing touch:)

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  13. I remember when crimp covers hit the scene (at least, whatever scene I could find seven-eight years ago)! My issue is I never know how to make the correct size LOOP. Hope you go over that in your book!!! :-)

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  14. A great tutorial, thanks! Is it ok to link to it from my blog?

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  15. I was just thinking about this as I'm contemplating this piece I'm working on and came back to look it up again because I remember you had some helpful tips! Thank you for sharing this!

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