Summertime means less layers of clothing and mixing up your style with a few new pieces of statement jewelry.
A light touch of leather makes a casual statement during the summer, while your boots hang out in the back of the closet for the season.
Janet Crowther and Katie Covington’s DIY jewelry book, Make a Statement, features a few leather projects, including a studded bracelet, which inspired us to make some more leather pieces that won’t weigh you down in the summer heat.
Make A Statement includes several jewelry making tutorials by Crowther and Covington, and is available for purchase.
Style 1
Materials needed:
Leather tape or banding
Scissors
Acrylic or fabric paint, as many colors as you like
Paintbrushes
Hammer-in Snaps
Hammer
Start by measuring your wrist. You’ll want to cut your leather slightly longer than the actual wrist measurement so your ends will overlap. Next, mark where you’ll want your snaps to sit.
For the snaps, you will need hammer-on hardware. These can be found at any fabric or craft store, and they come in a kit with a hammer tool. These snaps have four pieces and each piece has a “mate” that hammers into it. There are detailed instructions in the kit and it’s actually pretty easy to do.
Depending on your design, you can paint before or after you fasten your snaps. For the sake of the tutorial, we chose to do it after. It is certainly neater to do it before — but you can do this at your own discretion.
Once your paint is dry and your snaps are fastened, trim your edges to a point or round them off and you’re done.
Style 2
Materials needed:
Leather tape or banding
Scissors
Hammer-in Snaps
Metal loop
Hammer
The second style is more industrial and a little more sophisticated. Of course, start with your wrist measurement and cut your leather slightly larger. Wrap one end of the strap around your metal loop and secure with fabric or craft glue. While it dries, you can use a bobby pin to keep it in place. Don’t worry, you can just take it off later.
Attach the back half of your snap to the very end of your strap at the opposite end of your metal loop. This is how your bracelet attaches, and the end of the strap tucks underneath. From there, about an inch away, attach the front half of the snap. You can adjust based on your desired length. Make sure your snap placement isn’t twisting your strap around.
Finish off your ends by cutting them to a point or rounding them off. Now go and show off your bracelet.
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