When we received our recent large delivery of Preciosa Czech glass beads with brand new Bugle bead in, I was very excited to have a play. I intended to make a quick example of how you could use them to feature in our newsletter. Which then turned into making bugle bead earrings in 3 different styles. I just couldn’t help myself… if it wasn’t for the fact I needed to eat and sleep this might have been a project page about 30 different styles!
My initial idea was to show case the use of bugles beads, used as simple long bead. I sometimes think jewellery makers don’t use certain beads as they think of them as a bead for weaving with – however that isn’t the case. You can use any bead for any jewellery making!
Ocean ripple earrings
For this first pair I used the 35mm twisted silver lined crystal bugle, they’re so elegant and reflective (like sunlight on water). So I paired them with the Turquoise Miyuki mixed seed beads and created a long elegant dangly pair by threads the beads on headpins… I only just had enough space to make a loop in the wire of that central headpin, but it was worth the effort.
Materials used:
14 x 35mm Silver lined twisted Bugle beads (there’s 26 beads in 8g pack)
50 x size 11 seed beads. I picked beads from the Miyuki Aqua seed bead mix
2 x triangle connectors
14 x headpins
2 x fishhooks
If you want to make a version of these earrings you may find our video about how to make earrings very helpful. I did not have space on the head pins to wrap the wire, so make plain loop, you can easily trim off the excess wire as I did.
Golden Geometry Earrings
The second pair I kept very simple. I love the geometric shapes and I thought it’d be really effective to create a square from the beads. I chose the 20mm straight silver lined light gold bugle beads and cross over stitch (Right angle weave with just 2 beads). To ensure the thread wasn’t visible I used clear 0.25mm supplemax. To attach them to the fishhooks I simply threaded a headpin through the last bead and created a small loop at the top. I love how simple and effective these are. Top Tip – thing about how your earring will hang when you wear them, do you want the orientation of the bead to be the same or symmetrical?
Materials Used
16 x 20mm Silver Lined Light Gold bugle beads (there’s approx. 47 in 8g pack)
1m 0.25mm clear supplemax thread
2 x gold plated headpins
2 x gold plated fishhooks
Asymmetric fringe Earrings
Having created a tassel effect using head pins in my first pair of earrings. I decided to add fringing in the third pair andto go all black for a little drama. A mirrored asymmetric pair I thought would look great and a little twist on a classic shape. My initial thought was to use brick stitch, however I liked the idea of all my rows of beads lining up. Throughout the whole earring. So I used ladder stitch to create the right effect, with fringing at the bottom. To create the asymmetric fringing, I simply increased the number of beads I added on each new strand by 2 beads.
Material used
14 x 20mm Opaque Black Bugle Beads (there’s approx. 42 in 8g pack)
144 x size 8 Opaque Black seed beads
22 x size 11 Opaque Black seed beads
2m Black SoNo thread
2 x Black plated earwires
To see one of these earring being made in 18x speed you can watch our YouTube short here.
I hope these Bugle bead Earrings in 3 different styles helps spark some further ideas. Please do share your creations with us by tagging us on Facebook or Instagram.
Happy Beading.