About

Cost
$ $ $ $ $
Difficulty
• • • • •
Time
40 mins

Something to go with a Gaia-look
I was organizing my collection of beads when I came across a collection of snail shells and got the idea to turn them into earrings.

I already have a necklace with a pretty orange shell on it, these earrings will complete the look.

Posted by Maladignia from Amersfoort, Utrecht, The Netherlands • Published See Maladignia's 84 projects »
Tags

PrintEmbed
  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 1
    Step 1

    Draw your design on a piece of paper. (Excuse the crappy pictures. The camera and I hate each other...)

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 2
    Step 2

    Get your scrap leather and decide which colors to use. I picked blue and green.

    This collection mainly consists of samples given to me by a fellow student, years ago. They are mainly furniture samples and scraps from old couches or bags.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 3
    Step 3

    Draw your design the actual size you want your earrings and cut it out.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 4
    Step 4

    Use the paper design to draw the design onto your leather and cut it out.
    You can see the line that I followed for the fringes.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 5
    Step 5

    I had a second piece of leather to cut, so I cut it out from the paper and used that to get the leather shapes.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 6
    Step 6

    Sew the two pieces together the way you want them to hang.

    I had planned to sew around the whole green piece but ended up making just one stitch. It's a bit more playful this way and lots less work.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 7
    Step 7

    Cut a very thin strip of a large (or at least long) piece of leather.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 8
    Step 8

    Get your snail shells.

    I already had these lying around. This is how they are prepared for jewelry making:

    - Find an empty snail shell that is still intact. Clean it out with water.
    - Fill it up with glue from a glue gun. This makes them less fragile.
    - When that has hardened out use a drill size 1 to drill a hole near the edge of the shell, through the glue. This is tricky because the edges can still break, so go slowly.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 9
    Step 9

    Add jump rings to the snail shells, through the drilled hole.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 10
    Step 10

    Fasten the thin leather strip to the jump rings in the shells. I added a wooden bead for decoration.

    It helps to cut a tapered end to your leather strip so it will go through the bead with more ease.

  • Step 11

    Sorry, no picture of this.

    Prick a hole in your blue leather piece with the needle, on the top, where your earring hook will come.

    Add a jump ring through it. (This requires some wriggling)

    Tie the leather strip with the shell on it to the jump ring.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 12
    Step 12

    Get your seed beads and earring hooks.

    I added 5 white beads to a jump ring and put that on to the hooks.

  • How to make a feather earring. Nature's Earrings - Step 13
    Step 13

    Hang your earring onto the beaded jump ring with the hook and voila: finished!

Made this project? Share your version »

Comments

Ninoo
Ninoo · Paris, Île-de-France, FR · 10 projects
I Love it very nice
Reply

More Projects