Turn heads this winter with brenda harvey's ethnic-inspired design

What you need...

• BEADS Chips, turquoise x 2 strands, Nuggets, sea bamboo, red x 2 strands, Discs, turquoise, 10mm x 6; silver, hammered, 17mm (PB22-23) x, Bracelet bar (PB14-17), Pendant, disc, patterned, large (PB29-10), Spacers, small, (PB20-3) x, Rondelles, decorative (PB40-6) x 6,
  
  FINDINGS Wire, bead stringing, Earwires, silver, Calottes, silver, Clasps: toggle, silver (PB52-14); multistrand connector bar (PB52-12). Crimps, silver
  
  TOOLS Pliers: flat-nosed; round-nosed, Cutters, wire
  

instructions

1. Remove the short chain lengths from two necklace clasp connector bars and put to one side. Cut five 45cm lengths of bead stringing wire and thread three with turquoise chips and the other two with sea bamboo nuggets. Laying the strands out on a beading board will help you to gauge the length of each strand (you will find that the bottom strand needs to be much longer then the top one). Include a disc pendant at the midpoint on the top row.

2. Connect the multi-stranded section of the necklace to connector bars. The shortest inside strand with the disc pendant, sits on its own, on the first loop of the connector bar. The second and third holes each carry two strands – one turquoise and one red.

3. Add a single crimp bead and a decorative rondelle at the end of each strand, pass the wire through the connector loop and back down through the rondelle and the crimp. Compress the crimp with flat-nosed pliers, trim the excess wire to 1cm and feed it back through the adjacent beads to hide the end.

4. Cut a 40cm length of bead stringing wire, make a gentle crease at the mid-point and thread through the top single loop on one of the bars. Add the following sequence of beads and spacers, or continue until you reach the required length: a spacer, turquoise disc, spacer, red nugget, spacer, hammered disc, spacer, turquoise disc, spacer, red nugget, spacer, hammered disc, spacer, turquoise disc and a final spacer.

5. Add a single crimp bead followed by one half of a toggle clasp, take the wire back through the crimp bead and compress it with flat-nosed pliers. Trim the excess wire to 1cm and feed it back through the adjacent beads. To finish, repeat this sequence on the other side using the other half of the clasp.