Minverva Blogger Project - Crochet Jewellery

For my March Minerva project I decided to go for something completely different.  It’s a much smaller project than my others, but I’m really happy with it.

Inspired by the numerous “statement” necklaces you see everywhere at the moment I decided to crochet myself one.

I decided to use the DMC Pearl Cotton size 5, and then had to narrow down the colours I wanted to use.  There are lots!  In the end I picked three that looked good together (in my opinion!) but that had a high level of contrast.  I wanted each individual element of the necklace to stand out, so you could see the individual shapes as well as the overall shape.

Then I went searching for a motif to use.  Again, there are lots, but I finally settled on this one, which I found on crochet.about.com

I modified it slightly after playing around with it as I decided I didn’t want the scalloped edges.  I also tried a couple of different sized crochet hooks and settled on a 2mm one. 

For the larger motifs I made the starting ring, then used rounds 1 to 3 of the pattern, finishing off with a round of single crochet (US terminology) to provide a bit of stability to the edges, as I knew I would be inserting the jump rings into them to link them together.

I made one large motif in each colour, then 2 small motifs in each colour.  The small motifs are just the starting ring and round 1 of the pattern.

Once I’d made these motifs I started playing around with a layout, not sure at this stage if I wanted any more pieces added.  I decided not to add any more, as I didn’t want the finished necklace to be too big. 

This layout looked about perfect to me.

I used small silver jump rings to join the motifs together, making sure that the individual pieces wouldn’t flip over during wear.  In the photo below you can see where I placed the jump rings.

I then used a single jump ring to attach some chain to one side of the necklace and draped it round my neck so I could work out my desired length.  I cut the chain to this length and attached it to the other side with a jump ring.   Then I cut the attached length of chain in half and added a lobster claw clasp to one cut end and a jump ring to the other. 

The chain, jump rings and clasp are included in the kit.

Further experimentation led to me making a coordinating bracelet.

For this I made 3 small motifs in pink and three in jade.  The pink ones then had row 2 of the motif added in blue. 

To join them together I started with a green one and did a single crochet in 8 of the double crochets in the ring, then picked up a pink/blue motif and did a single crochet stitch in 16 of the stitches in the outer round.  Then going back to a green motif I did single crochets in 8 of the double crochet stitches.  I repeated this until I got to the last pink/blue motif, where I did single crochets in 36 stitches around the edge.  I then worked my way back down the other side with 8 stitches in a green motif and 16 in a pink/blue one til I got back to where I started from.

After weaving in the ends I added a single jump ring to one end and a lobster claw clasp to the other.  If you have very small hands you could permanently join the bracelet into a bangle type cuff.  I can just about slip this over my hand without unfastening the clasp.

I can’t wait for the sun to shine so I can put on a nice summery top and wear my new accessories!

 

If you'd like to make your own crochet jewellery, you can buy the kit here.