How to Make a Custom Guitar Strap

A knitted guitar strap

Guitar straps not only keep your guitar at the right height when you're playing standing up, but they can also add some personality and fun to your onstage persona. While you could pay hundreds of dollars for a fancy snakeskin or rare leather strap, you could also make your own and customize it any way you want. This article will teach you how.

Things You'll Need

• Leather or fabric, cut to 4 inches wide
• Belt buckle or slider (optional)
• Scissors
• Leather hole punch

Instructions

1. Buy a strip of leather or other material to use as your main guitar strap. You can also recycle old items for your strap material: a leather belt; old suspenders, which are already adjustable; denim fabric from a pair of old jeans; painted canvas. Some people have even made them out of inner tubes from old bicycle tires. If you knit or crochet, you can make your own strap material. The strap should be at least 4 inches wide so that it will be comfortable where it crosses your shoulder.

2. Cut the strap to the right length for you and your guitar. To make an adjustable strap using leather, cut the strap into two pieces and fasten a belt buckle to one end of one piece. Use the leather hole punch to punch holes for the buckle in the end of the other strap, so that you can move the buckle up and down the length of the strap to adjust it. To make a fabric strap adjustable, use a belt buckle or a slider, found at craft stores. Be sure that the buckle or slider doesn't sit directly on your shoulder.

3. Use the scissors or hole punch to punch holes in both ends of the strap to fit the strap nuts on the guitar. Attach to the guitar at the strap nuts, and you're ready to play.