https://www.cutoutandkeep.net/projects/zombie-girl-bottle-cap-earrings • Posted by dontdreamitbeit
This has been a long overdue project that I've been dying to finish, despite a few minor set backs :) I first got the idea for this from watching the old MTV show "Why Can't I Be You?" where in an episode, a girl made her own bottle cap jewelry and instantly I fell in love with the idea. I apologize in advance for my terrible webcam quality. I need a new one...fast.
This has been a long overdue project that I've been dying to finish, despite a few minor set backs :) I first got the idea for this from watching the old MTV show "Why Can't I Be You?" where in an episode, a girl made her own bottle cap jewelry and instantly I fell in love with the idea. I apologize in advance for my terrible webcam quality. I need a new one...fast.
Okay so here goes! You're going to take 2 of your bottle caps and lay them flat on your board. (You will need the board to ensure you don't hammer into anything you don't want to ruin).
Once you've done step 1, you'll need your pliers. Note: Don't worry if you don't have any fancy jewelry making ones. Although they are generally made for jewelry making and are probably better to use - I don't own any and I just used my Dad's old pair I found lying around. With your pliers you're going to gently pull a part of your bottle cap upwards to make the area you are going to nail flatter.
Once you have bent them slightly flat (which is totally reversible) you'll need to grab your hammer and nail and puncture two holes into the lip of the cap. One thing you could do (which I didn't think of at the time) is to make a small pen mark with a sharpie to where you want your hole to use it as a guide. Be very gentle with this as you don't want to hurt yourself :)
With the holes successfully hammered in, the next step is to grab your jump ring(s). It's your choice on how many you want to use, as they determine the length of the earrings. For mine, I used 3 jump rings and looped them together. Using your pliers, you will open the jump rings up until they look a little like this.
With your jump ring open, loop it through the hole in the cap and leave it open. As I said before, the amount of jump rings you use, is totally up to you. The more you use and loop together, the longer they'll dangle.
With that done it's time to grab your image to put inside the cap! It can be anything at all, a photo, a printed image (although I do recommend you print on photo paper like I did rather than normal paper as normal paper tends to tear), a cut from a magazine ....or anything at all as long as the image is 1 inch wide and will fit inside the cap no problems. When you've decided on your image, get your glue (and again be careful) and glue the back of your image.
Once glued, put your image inside of the cap like so and wait for it to dry. I waited around 10 - 15 minutes for mine but times will vary depending on the glue.
Once dried you need your epoxy stickers to place over the image for a great looking finish. It also helps to protect the image from any damage. I got mine from Ebay for around £5 for a set of 50. They are really simple to work with.
With that done your cap should look like this. Now, back in step 5 I told you to leave the jump ring open. The next thing you need to do is take your earring hook and loop it through the open jump ring. Once done and you're happy with how it hangs - close the jump ring and voila! You are done :)
The finished product!