I love making wrapped loops! My first chain necklace I made was simply a chain of beads all secured with wrapped loops. Well by the end of that necklace I had my technique down and rarely do I substitute the wrapped loop for a simple loop these days.

You will require some basic tools to make wire wrapped loops. A pair of side cutters, two pairs of chain nose pliers and a pair of round nose pliers. If you do not have these we sell the two pliers on our web site and you may even find the cutters in Hubbies tool box.

For the earrings I am about to make I used 24 gauge ball head pins as I find the thinner gauge kinder on my wrist. As the loop is wrapped there is no worry about the thinner wire pulling apart. You will need  1.5 to 2 inch long pins.                     

We are making a nice pair of double dangle earrings that you will have together in less than fifteen minutes. Firstly string your bottom dangle beads onto your head pin. Hold the wire with your chain nose pliers and bend the wire with your fingers to right angles against the pliers. Use the pliers to decide how long you want your wrap to be. Holding the wire with the end of the chain nose will allow for a small stem meaning less loops than using the thicker part of the pliers.

Cut your wire tail to 2 cm length and grab the bend of the wire with your round nose pliers. Position your pliers to make a loop the diameter you are after. I usually work about 5 mm in from my tip. You want to hold you work so that the tail is facing away from you, I find that placing the RN pliers in the crook of the bend works best. Using chain nose pliers grab the end of the wire tail and bring over towards you wrapping over the RN pliers. Around half way through you will have to reposition the pliers so that you can continue and wrap totaly around your pliers shank.

click each image for detailed picture

Now for an important lesson that most of us only learn after we have done the opposite several times! DON’T wrap your loop yet. You can get away with doing one free wrapped loop (following pics) but the rest will need to be attached first.

Here we have the first turn of your loop. Use one pair of chain nose to hold across the loop in your non dominant hand. Grasp the tip of the wire tail with the other chain nose and pull the loop around. You will have to reposition your hold each 180 degree turn.

Keep winding the wire around untill you have the number of loops you are after. Nip the over hang off with your cutters and press the wire end in neatly to finish the wrap off with your chain nose pliers.

Use some wire or a pin with the head cut off and make your top dangle. It was this pin that I made my first wrapped loop on the one end, leaving the other open for beads and enough for a long tail to wrap. I then attached the closed loop to my bottom dangle (see above), popped the beads on and wrapped the  top loop onto my earring findings.

You now have a pair of ornately finished earrings. Use wrapped loops for extra strength in any wire design, no more worrying about the strength of your piece. Please contact us if you have any queries in this tutorial and we will publish a Q & A page for all to access.

A tip, if your head pins are bent you can straighten them with your fingers and a cloth or use a pair of Nylon jaw pliers. Straightening does harden the wire so don’t over do it. If you find you mark the wire when making loops etc then try coating them with some tool magic which can be found in our tools and books catalogue.

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Free beading tutorial by Yvonne Kristel all rights reserved.