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The Ultimate Jeweller’s Toolkit: Complete Guide To Jewellery Making Essentials
A jeweller's tool kit is not as complicated as it might appear, and with a few sets of pliers, stringing materials and jewellery findings you'll be all set to start creating your own accessories. Whether you're into beaded jewellery or want to explore metal stamping or resin crafting as a beginner, our complete guide to jewellery making essentials is here to get you started. Learn about the huge variety of beads, stringing materials, basic jewellery making tools, jewellery findings and more in our comprehensive guide. Start reading and get ready to set up your jewellery making toolkit with Spotlight today!
Quick Links
- Video Guide: Jewellery Tools, Findings & Beads
- Jewellery Beads, Pendants & Charms
- Findings, Tools & Stringing Materials
- Resin Jewellery Making
- Metal Stamping
- Storage For Beads & Findings
Video Guide: Jewellery Tools, Findings & Beads
Get the best overview of jewellery beads, tools and more with our in-depth video tutorial on everything jewellery making. Watch and learn how to use jewellery pliers, thread beads and finish your creations with the right jewellery findings.
Jewellery Beads, Pendants & Charms
There is an almost limitless variety of beads to be found and made, and the more you look into these incredible creative materials, the more you will discover. Beads can be made of almost anything including:
- Manufactured materials such as plastic, resin, and glass.
- Natural materials such as bone, shell, stone, gems, and wood.
- Craft materials such as earthenware, ceramic, air dry clay & polymer clay.
- Precious objects can be turned into beads by drilling holes in them, setting them in resin, or wrapping them in wire.
What a bead is made of will determine its cost, how heavy it is and aesthetic qualities such as colour, transparency and texture.
Discover A Range Bead Colours, Textures & Shapes
Seed beads, glass beads, plastic beads, alphabet beads, wooden beads and pearl style beads to use to limitless effect in your jewellery creations. Spotlight's extensive range of beads, bead packs & strands also includes chunky pony beads, spacer beads, heishi beads, shell beads, stones and friendship bracelet kits to fill your jeweller's toolkit to the brim.
Choose seed beads to create delicate and intricate designs, pearl style beads for elegant creations and shell beads and stones to add a natural accent to your pieces. You can learn more about all the different beads types and how to use them with our in-depth beads buying guide. We even cover how to make your own beads such as paper beads and polymer clay beads so you can take your crafting to the next level!
Customise Your Creations With Pendants & Charms
Jewellery charms and pendants are a great way to add visual interest and design to necklaces, bracelets and earrings. Pendants are typically a singular decoration that's worn on a simple strand or chain as a necklace, but they can also be combined with other beads to striking effect. Charms are typically smaller adornments, and can be thought of as highly decorative, shaped beads. Pendants and charms often include a loop for ease of threading or attaching to your jewellery, whereas some other styles may need to be attached with a bail finding. At Spotlight, you can find highly decorative charms in the shapes of leaves, hearts, rhinestones, stars, flowers and so much more.
Findings, Tools & Stringing Materials
Once you've decided on your beads, pendants or charms, you'll need to determine how you want to assemble and wear them on your body. Here's a quick snapshot of the tools and materials you may require to bring your creative vision to life:
Jewellery Findings
Findings are the basic building blocks used to assemble and finish your pieces: think earring findings like hooks and studs, jump rings & split rings for joining and clasps & crimps to complete necklaces and bracelets ready for wearing. Head pins and eye pins are common finding components used in jewellery as well, and are short lengths of wire that can be used for threading beads. They are then joined to clasps, hooks or jump rings by creating closed loops with tools like pliers. Jewellery findings come in a huge variety of shapes, designs and metallic finishes including silver, brass, gold or oxidised tones like gunmetal.
Jewellery Pliers & Cutters
Pliers will be some of the most used items in your kit, with different shapes used to cut and shape wire, head pins, crimps and more. It's handy to have two pairs of flat-nose pliers, so that you have one for holding an item and another for manipulating it. Amongst the different jewellery tool types are flush cutters used for cutting wire, flat nose pliers for bending and shaping wire, chain nose pliers for detailed work and round nose pliers for creating coils and loops.
Shop Beads Tools & Accessories
Stringing Materials For Jewellery
You may choose to create stranded jewellery with beads using wire or cord. Here are some of the common options available for use in your jewellery making:
- Bead wire: Beading wire features a fine diameter and smooth surface, and is made from very fine strands of steel wire coated in nylon.
- Shaping wire: Shaping wire is a flexible length of metal wire that can be manipulated with pliers and cutters.
- Bead cord & threads: Available in strong nylon materials or elastic options for ease of assembling, bead threads are used for bead weaving and making stranded jewellery.
- Leather cord & thonging: Add a contrasting touch to your jewellery with leather thonging or colourful waxed threads. The larger diameters of these stringing materials makes them a great option for kids who are finessing their fine motor skills.
- Jewellery chains: Chains are a great way to create professional-looking jewellery pieces with the additions of beads, pendants and charms. Explore a range of chain sizes and weights, available in brass, gold, silver and copper-coloured options.
Shop Bead Thread, Cord & Stringing
Learn How To Use Jewellery Tools & Stringing Materials
Spotlight has assembled an in-depth DIY & buying guide to answer all your questions about using jewellery tools, stringing materials and jewellery findings. Learn more about the different types of jewellery pliers, how to open and close jump rings for jewellery and how to choose the best stringing material for your creations.
Resin Jewellery Making
Jewellery resin is an exciting jewellery making medium that can be used to create truly unique pieces. Jeweller's resin making starts off as a liquid that sets or "cures" to a solid form. This allows you to cast pieces in moulds, include found objects and even tint it to your favourite colours. UV resins are a great way to engage in beginner resin projects - simply add the resin to findings or moulds and then let it cure with a specialist UV resin lamp.
Essential resin jewellery making materials include coloured and clear resins, resin moulds and resin tools designed to aid with pouring, mixing and measuring. Spotlight has free resin jewellery projects online, including the UV Resins project where you can learn how to make resin hair clips, resin earrings and resin bangles. Our In Bloom Resin Flower Accessories project takes you through creating floral jewellery pieces using fresh dried flowers, and includes detailed instructions, materials list and a downloadable project sheet for your convenience.
Resin Jewellery For Beginners
Want to know more about resin jewellery making for beginners? Check out our comprehensive DIY & buying guide and get the low-down on all the essential tips & tricks for making resin jewellery and accessories. Find out more about the different types of jewellery resin, how to add objects to your resin creations, setting up your workspace and essential safety tips to start you on your resin making journey.
Resin Jewellery DIY & Buying Guide
Metal Stamping
With the right tools, you can create textured patterns, designs and lettering on your jewellery pieces to truly customise your creations. The art of metal stamping is a fun and accessible technique that uses a special stamp and hammer to transfer designs to a metal blank. To get started, you'll need a stamping hammer, metal stamps, a steel block to work on and a selection of metal blanks. Jewellery blanks are pre-cut pieces of flat metal that come in a range of shapes and sizes. They're typically made of aluminium alloys that have enough malleability to accommodate the impressions made by your stamp. Once you have completed the stamping process you can use a specialised black enamel marker to add colour to the stamped sections to truly make your designs stand out.
You can use your stamped metal pieces to make personalised cuff bracelets, charm bracelets, necklaces, key chains and pet tags. Check out some of the free metal stamping projects online at Spotlight to learn more about the metal stamping technique and get inspired:
Storage For Beads & Findings
Once you have stocked up on all your essential beads, findings, stringing materials and jewellery tools, you'll need a place to store it all! Organising your craft supplies is an important step to ensure quick and easy access to everything you might need. It's also a great way to aid creativity and making, as you won't need to interrupt your "flow" while finding what you need next.
Bead storage containers are an excellent starting point for setting up your jewellery making workspace. Look for compartmentalised trays, so you can easily sort out beads and findings according to type, colour or size.
Designs with clear plastic lids offer you the convenient advantage of being able to see everything in your container at a glance - and they're also easy to stack so you can save on space. Another great option is drawer storage units, which are tiny sets of drawers designed to sit on your desktop. Other designs include stackable containers, connector jars and storage boxes with handles for ease of transport.
Create Beautiful Jewellery With Tools & Supplies From Spotlight
No matter what your favourite jewellery style or medium, you can find all the essential supplies you need to get creating at Spotlight. From beads, chains, pliers, and storage containers to resin making suppliers and metal stamping tools, you can explore a whole world of materials and techniques to make your vision come to life.
Inspire your next creations with our free jewellery & beading projects online, where you can find projects for beaded jewellery, resin jewellery, metal stamping and so much more. Don't forget to explore our other jewellery making guides as well, where we have all the in-depth, detailed knowledge you need to get creating. From beads, bead tools, resin and stringing materials, we cover every aspect of creating DIY jewellery and accessories.
