Find Out Friday: Guest Designer Charlene Sevier's Bead Cap Chandelier Earrings

We have a very special Find Out Friday to share with you this week. We are pleased to feature talented jewelry designer Charlene Sevier who has created a lovely pair of chandelier earrings with the primary ingredient being bead caps. These are so clever and ornate looking that we just had to share her tutorial with all of Beadaholique's fans. Thank you Charlene! We can't wait to see what you come up with next. 

Here’s what you’ll need:

• 18 bead caps with holes along the bottom. They need to have an even number of holes. These bead caps  have eight holes along the bottom.
• 18 3mm or 4mm beads for your accent beads. Mine are bright orange wood beads.
• 18 E-beads or 3mm beads to put inside the bead caps. Without them, the bead caps flop around. I chose some luster E-beads in a color that complemented the design but let the orange beads take center stage.
• 18 head pins
• Pair of ear wires

INSTRUCTIONS:

Take a head pin and add an inside bead, bead cap and accent bead. All of the head pins will be strung in this manner. Make a plain or wrapped loop. This component is the top of the earring.

Take a second head pin and add the beads and bead cap. Make a loop that goes into one of the holes of the first bead cap. Then take another head pin and add the beads and bead cap. Looking at the first bead cap carefully, count the holes along the bottom. These bead caps have eight holes. The first head pin on the second row is in one hole. Skip over three holes and add another head pin into the fourth hole. This puts one head pin on either side of the top component with three holes in between them on both sides. If you don’t count correctly, your earrings will not lay flat.

The next step is the trickiest step of the whole deal – and it’s not that hard. Thread a head pin and make a loop that goes through one hole in the bottom of both of the two components you just added.

Counting the holes the same way you did earlier, add components for the third row into the outer edges of the bead caps above them. You now have a row of three components.

To create the fourth row, take a head pin with beads and bead cap and join the left hand and center bead cap of the third row together. Then, counting spaces again, add another head pin to join the center and right hand bead caps of the third row together. This completes the fourth row which has two bead caps. A final head pin joins them together. Add an ear wire, repeat for the second earring and done - you can see the finished product in the photo at the top of this blog.

Charlene graciously gave us permission to use these photos and her instructions. To learn more about Charlene Sevier, check out her blog: The Bead Dreamer's Blog. You can also purchase some of her beautiful work from her Etsy Store. 

Inspired by Charlene, I decided to try out her design in silver with some different bead caps and beads. Here is what I came up with --->  

I used the bright silver plated open point crown 8.5mm bead cap for all the bead caps and then the pretty light green beads are misty green opal glass faceted 4mm rounds. 


Thank you again Charlene!