I’m sure a lot of you have probably seen the awesome tutorial for these DIY bracelets over at Honestly… WTF.

These ladies have such amazing bracelet tutorials; I love them. I made a few of these and then I decided to add my own twists here and there. Here are a few of mine:

The top one (1) is basically a straightforward execution of their design, and then I played with the ideas. Here’s what I got.

(2) two-tone seed beads, in light and dark gray

(3) hexagonal beads spaced farther apart

(4) faceted, semi-precious stones instead of seed beads

And I made one change to their pattern that I think gives the bracelet a slightly cleaner look.

To learn how to make the bracelets themselves, please visit their tutorial over at Honestly… WTF. Once you’ve got that, here’s what I did.

To make the neater clasp, first, I didn’t tie a knot at the end of my braiding. I simply threaded on the button as they suggest. Then, I threaded the twine back through the button and then tied it on the backside of the button. That way, you don’t have the knot sitting on the top of the button; it’s more hidden underneath.

To make the two-tone seed bead bracelet, get two sets of beads in complementary colors. You will thread them 2 at a time in each color. For example, if you are doing the gray and silver, you’ll start with one gray on one side and one gray on another (for a total of 2), then for the next “row” you’ll do a silver on one side and a silver on the other. Keep switching off to end up with stripes like in the photo above. You could also do one long stripe in each color, in which case you’ll want to always thread one color on one side and the other on the opposite side.

To make the hexagonal bracelet, you’ll need size 8/0 hexagonal seed beads like these. Because they are a little bulkier, you’ll want to space them more. As you braid, you’ll put one bead on each side, and then add one crossover of braiding without beads right after it. Then you will go back to adding beads. In other words, you’ll put a bead, crossover, put a bead, crossover, then crossover (no bead), crossover (no bead), then back to adding beads again.

To make the semi-precious bracelet, you follow the exact procedure at Honestly…WTF, but you use 3mm faceted semi-precious stones, like these. I used garnet here. You can find lots of different gemstones at pretty reasonable prices at this size, so the options for bracelets are endless!

I want to thank the Honestly girls for this tutorial, because it really is brilliant and I think the results are stunning. I love the waxed twine, which is a new material for me and I will probably use it in lots of other projects now!

Have you made any of these? Did you mix it up or what?

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