DIY: Floating Necklace

You know what I love? Jewelry. You know what I hate? Spending money on it. Does anyone like spending $20+ on a necklace when the materials to make it cost a fraction of that? I don't. So, as a beginner jewelry maker, I decided to take on this seemingly simple project: a floating necklace. 

I bought a necklace like this a few years ago, because I liked how delicate it looked. I bought larger beads than the ones in my purchased necklace, because I wanted to play around with the look a little. This is how I duplicated one of my favorite pieces of jewelry. Oh, and I apologize for the quality of the above photo! It came out really grainy.

Materials:

• jewelry board
• bead stringing wire
• 18 beads (I used glass pearls, which you can purchase at any craft store)
• 36 #1 crimp tubes
• 2 #3 crimp beads
• 1 clasp
• flat jewelry pliers
• crimping tool

How to:

• Cut 3 pieces of stringing wire: a 25 inch piece, a 23.5 inch piece, and a 22 inch piece.
• Lay the 25 inch piece of wire in one of the jewelry board channels.
• Thread a crimp tube, a bead, and another tube onto the wire. Repeat this process 6 more times, so you have tube, bead, tube, tube, bead, tube, etc. You should have a total of 7 beads and 14 crimp tubes on your 25 inch piece of wire when you're done.
• Center the 4th bead at position '0' on the jewelry board. 
• Using your flat jewelry pliers, crimp the tubes on either side of the center bead, securing it in place.
• Spread the remaining 6 beads evenly on each side, and crimp the tubes as you did for the center bead.

• Lay the 23.5 inch beading wire in the next board channel.
• Thread 6 beads and 12 crimp tubes onto this wire, as you did previously (tube, bead, tube, tube, bead, tube, etc.).
• Position the beads in the spaces between those on the 25 inch piece of wire so they are staggered relative to the beads on the first strand. Crimp the tubes to secure the beads in place.
• Lay the 22 inch beading wire in the final board channel. 
• Thread 5 beads and 10 crimp tubes onto the wire as done previously.
• Line these beads up with those on the 25 inch wire, and secure by crimping the tubes.

• Hold the three ends of one side of the necklace and thread them through a #3 crimp bead.
• Then, thread the ends through the loop of the clasp and back through the crimp bead to attach the clasp to the necklace.
• Using your crimping tool, crimp the crimp #3 bead. Trim excess wire.
• Repeat these steps on the other side to attach the other piece of the clasp.

And that is how you make a floating necklace! If you look closely, you can see that I used 12 large glass pearls and 6 medium-sized glass pearls. The 6 smaller ones were used as the top beads on each side of each strand. You can, of course, adjust the number of beads and/or length of the necklace to your liking.