Accessories Tips for a beginner in jewelry making?

How fun! I'm getting back into jewelry making, both for myself and my dolls. Hopefully I can be of some help.

When it comes to jewelry making for dolls, be very mindful of scale. For example, a 4-6mm pearl on human jewelry is going to be a spacer bead and hardly noticeable. On a 1/3 or 1/4 sized doll, it's going to look like what a medium sized pearl would look like on a human. On 1/6 doll, it'll look have a chunky look, but in a cute and quirky way. On anything smaller than that, it will be very Lisa Simpson.

On resources, if you don't mind waiting a couple of weeks for your materials, I would suggest ordering jewelry making supplies from AliExpress or Taobao. I found the selection of supplies in brick and mortar stores to be a bit drab, but online, I was able to find things like iridescent beads, those cute plastic stars, etc. You can easily buy a variety of bead sizes for under $5-$10 that way, too. I'd spend a little more on tools, though. A good set of beading supplies will make your life so much easier.

 

I don't make a lot of jewelry, so I'm certainly no expert, but my suggestion is to invest in some very fine-tipped jewelry pliers. Those little pointy ends are a big help in opening and closing teeny tiny jump rings and chain links.

 

Miniature charms are the best! Make sure you use smaller chain and beads, or it'll look out of proportion. Unless you want a chunky look. I agree that you should get nice jewelery pliers! Also jewelery wire cutters so you don't mess up your scissors. And there are different types of jewelery pliers with different purposes so read up on that! Honestly jewelery making is so simple at it's most basic form. Just buy chain, charms and clasps, put them together and viola! Also I suggest buying a pack of head pins, they are sooo useful. I'm always running out of jewelery rings, so don't be like me, stock up on everything often! Online has lots of nice things, but depending where you live, in the USA Joann's and Michael's has great jewelery stuff for cheap! Lastly I'd make sure you keep everything sorted, cuz mixed up jewelery parts is the worst. Also make sure the lighting is good when you're working so you don't hurt your eyes!

 

Another really great place to get supplies is Fire Mountain Beads' website. They have a kind of overwhelming number of choices in many, many different materials (I get a lot of my semiprecious gems there, but they also have wood, plastic, base and precious metals, etc).

 

I never made any jewelry seriously and everyone pretty much mentioned any tips I can think of but I will say to keep your eye out for anything. You never know what you could find and use to make a charm.

 

For raw materials, try thrift stores (Goodwill, St. Vincent's in my area) and look for human jewelry. Many items can be converted to bjd jewelry, body armor or clothing accessories. Good hunting!

 

For beads like seed beads use 11/0 as they are like sand, I make my own jewellery and have a store for custom bracelets and that, you just need to practice and look for anything that is tiny, charms and things are great I use eBay mainly for all my beads as I can’t get them near me in the size I need, also look up patterns and don’t be afraid of trying it out bigger and then sizing down to get a feel for what you want it to look like ^^

 

Seconding the idea of ordering supplies online. I do that too as supplies from physical stores tend to be more expensive where I come from. If you're ordering online, be prepared to do a lot of measuring from your end. I find knowing the rough sizes of beads and chains you're going to use and having an idea of what range of sizes (e.g. 2-4mm) are acceptable/to scale for your doll are very helpful, since you can't have the product in front of you. Also bear in mind slight colour differences e.g. bright vs dark silver, which may be difficult to tell from photographs.

 

I actually recommend against using 11/0 seed beads as they are too large for many purposes even on 1/3 and 1/4 dolls. I recommend 15/0, 13/0 Charlottes, and if you can find them, mako beads, which are very tiny tubes that even look in proportion when made into woven-bead jewelry. You will almost certainly have to order these online, though Fire Mountain does carry a decent selection of 15/0 size.

 

I know that you are probably looking for shops, but if I may offer some advice from experience:

If you use metal parts like spacer beads or charm pendants, you might want to apply a very thin coat of clear nail polish on the back, unless larger beads prevent direct contact with the doll. Metal parts can leave tiny dark scratch marks on your doll or chip the blush, if a heavy pendant hits the face while handling the doll.

 

This is a really helpful thread! I've thought about making jewelry but it's always felt too daunting to to try to find things small enough. Everyone has shared such amazing and helpful ideas.
After a quick search of eBay I've found so much I can use, including broken jewelry lots that contain so many different elements!
Thanks everyone!
For a newbie it's seriously wonderful

 

I apologize for necro-ing a thread that's over a year old, but some of the information I'm looking for is already here and I thought it would be better to continue with questions and advice in this thread than creating a new one.

So, thanks to all the helpful responses above, I know that 2-4mm beads are the best for scale. I'll probably lean towards 2mm and 3mm though. I also need to look into buying jewelry pliers and jewelry wire cutters.

However, for the elastic, does it matter what type I get? I was looking at this: https://tinyurl.com/ycdr8je3
I was looking at getting .5mm elastic, but would that be the correct size?

What would be the best type (and size) of elastic or cord for necklaces? I'm working with slim-minis and SDs. Also, how would I know what type of clasps I should buy? Would I need them more for a necklace than a bead bracelet?

Thanks in advance!

 

SDs and similar dolls should probably be able to handle 0.5mm elastic just fine, depending on how visible you want the elastic to be. You may also want to look into other materials like fireline (non-stretchy, but thin and nearly invisible), nylon upholstery thread (non stretchy, but strong and shiny, good for imitating leather cord and similar.) and tiger tail (coated beading wire, can be nice for imitating metal chains, but does not knot well).

Clasps, unfortunately, are by far going to be the hardest thing to find to scale. If they are small, they are usually hard to operate with human hands, and so are rarely produced. However, there are plenty of way to finish jewelry without relying on them. Fire mountain (already mentioned, but one of my favorite suppliers) has an article called "a dozen ways to end a necklace"--and many of these techniques can be used on other pieces of jewelry.

If you are working in small sizes I would also strongly, strongly recommend getting flexible beading needles too--they are like little wire loops with a point. Makes anything at that scale easier to manage. It may also help to find something to use as a bead mat (a scrap piece of velvet will do, or anything with some texture and friction). If you do get needle nose pliers, get a pair--and look to spend at least something in the 10-15 dollar range for each, if new. A lot of the $20-25 jewelry plier sets tend to very easily get marred or rusty, which makes them a pain for precision work.

If you have an idea of what kind of jewelry you want to make, it will help narrow down the suggestions.

 

@VanishedEra Thank you for the advice! I'm still researching, but I'm mostly interested in simple bead jewelry, necklaces with cute charms and chokers.
Stuff like this. I'm ok with not using a metal chain.
https://cache.net-a-porter.com/images/products/1232165/1232165_bk_2000.jpg
https://images.neimanmarcus.com/ca/2/product_assets/P/A/H/X/4/NMPAHX4_mz.jpg
https://i.etsystatic.com/8694122/r/il/bb304e/839512468/il_1588xN.839512468_bckt.jpg
https://beadworksfairfield.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/bead-stringing-class-280-240.jpg
https://ae01.alicdn.com/kf/HTB1zcVVtVuWBuNjSszbq6AS7FXa0.jpg

 

The things you linked look very doable in doll-scale, and it probably won't hurt the aestethic if they are slightly oversized, so good picks!

For chokers and other tight fitting things, elastic is definitely helpful. If you are ok with taking off the head/hands/feet when applying tighter fitting jewelry, it may make sense to just form everything as a secure loop and use a bit of glue to secure the string. Be careful with 15/0 seed beads, as those things are tiny and would probably not take any kind of elastic.

Dolls can also afford to have slightly less secure closures than people, so you may be able to make do with some other trickery, like magnets. Some people have modded their dolls by gluing magnets inside the head to be able to mount earrings--it might be possible to do similar thing in other parts of the body for other jewelry, You could also make a lot of use of toggle or hook and loop closures, as those can be made on a small scale if you have the wire.

 

If you want to use elastic or are going to take off the head or hands to put the jewelry on, I'd recommend crimp beads rather than just glue. They're little round metal beads that you slip over something you want to secure and mash them in place with pliers. So like if you're securing the end of a bracelet you slip both ends of the string into the crimp bead and crimp it in place. Adding a bit of glue to it will ensure it will stay in place for a long time. They're cheap and come in different sizes and metal finishes.

 

Hello everyone!
I have been trying to get into jewelry making, but I am having just the worst time with crimp tubes. It takes at least 2 or 3 tries before i can get it to actually crimp. I even bought crimp pliers and it doesn't seem to help. Any tips for getting them to actually hold?

 

Crimp tubes can be tricky for sure! It may help if you happen to have a picture of an attempted crimp.

The easiest thing to check would be your materials--if you still have the back of the package it should indicate somewhere what size and material it's appropriate for. The ones for elastic tend to be specialized and longer than those for wire or other cords.

You can also use more than one crimp bead, or put some jewelry cement/glue at the base/inside of the tube for added security.