Jewelry Making: Putting On Clasps

Professionally finished pieces are the mark of a good jewelry designer.

A clasp can simply be a tiny lobster claw that unobtrusively keeps your jewelry on, or it can be a crystal-studded toggle clasp that forms the centerpiece of your bracelet. Either way, correctly adding a clasp to a piece of jewelry is one of the most important skills that a beginning jewelry designer will learn. You don't have to be a jewelry designer to realize that someone who knots the ends of their bracelets isn't one. A professionally finished necklace or bracelet will go a long way in adding to your portfolio as a designer.

Things You'll Need

• Unfinished bracelet
• Crimp beads
• Bead tips
• Crimping pliers
• Chain-nose pliers
• Glue
• Clasp
• Jump rings

Instructions

1. Add a bead tip and then a crimp bead to your necklace or bracelet. The crimp bead should be at the very end of your beading cord, while the bead tip should rest in between the crimp bead and the beads that form your jewelry.

2. Secure the crimp bead around your cord with crimping pliers and add a dot of glue over the crimp to secure it. Many jewelry designers simply knot the ends of their cord and hide the knots; however, a crimp bead provides a more secure closure.

3. Close the bead tip with chain-nose pliers so that it hides the crimp bead.

4. Repeat steps 1 through 3 for the other side of your necklace or bracelet. Once you have finished this step, you should have a piece with all of your beads secured onto the cord by the hidden crimp bead and the visible bead tip.

5. Open up a jump ring using your chain-nose pliers. Thread this open ring through the loop on your bead tip and the loop on one side of your clasp, and then close the ring tightly. This step will attach half of your clasp (for example, one part of a toggle clasp or one side of a box clasp) to your jewelry.

6. Add a second jump ring to the link that you just made between your clasp and the finished end of your bead strand. Doubling up your jump rings provides your jewelry with a more professional look, and it ensures that your pieces will break much less frequently. Especially since bracelets are damaged at a higher rate than necklaces or earrings, you should use double rings for them.

7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 to add the other half of the clasp to the other side of your bracelet.

8. Wait for 24 hours for the glue in your crimp beads to dry before wearing your piece.

References

• The Jewelry Site: Ending a Tigerwire necklace: Using Beads Tips and Crimps