Monday, May 14, 2018

Royal Wedding Bracelet with various beads

Yesterday I blogged HERE about the free pattern by Sandra Halpenny called "Royal Wedding Bracelet". You'll find Sandra's tutorial HERE. The pattern calls for Rulla beads but I wondered if any other kinds of 2-hole beads might work with the design. I tried regular SuperDuo beads, Smooth Outline SuperDuo beads, Mini DiamonDuos, CzechMates Bricks and IOS par Puca beads. As you will see below, some of them worked quite well and others not so much.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • SuperDuo beads "Pastel Pink"

I made the sample above with regular SuperDuo beads. They don't work well at all and the motifs don't have a distinct shape to them. They're pretty much a mess.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • Mini DiamonDuo beads "Pastel Zircon Blue"

This sample was made with Mini DiamonDuos. Although the motifs have a different shape than when made with Rulla beads, they do have a nice shape. However, the motifs are unstable because the seed beads tend to flop in front of or behind the points of the DiamonDuos.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • CzechMates Bricks "Opaque Rose Gold Topaz Luster"

The sample above has CzechMates Brick beads. They work quite well with this pattern and the motifs have a nice round shape.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • IOS® par Puca® beads "Opaque White Ceramic Look"

This sample with IOS® par Puca beads looks very similar to the Rulla version. They're just slightly smaller than Rulla beads. I would definitely use these beads to make this bracelet sometime.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • Smooth Outline SuperDuo beads "Blue Turquoise Picasso"

These smooth outline SuperDuo beads also work very nicely with this design. I did have to make one tweak though. Instead of adding six 11/0 seed beads on each side, I only added five.


  • 11/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • 8/0 seed beads Miyuki "Dark Bronze" (457)
  • Smooth Outline SuperDuo beads "Ivory"

This started out to be a bracelet but I ran out of thread and I also found a thread looped around a bead. It also is made with smooth outline SuperDuos. I'm posting this photo because I thought you might like to see how a bracelet made with just this motif would look. It's delicate and thin enough to make a wrap bracelet if you don't mind using a ton of seed beads.


Supply Emporium has quite a few colors in Smooth Outline SuperDuos. Note that the 15% off coupon code has changed from "15BLOG" to "CRAFTY15".
 

3 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for your experimentation!

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  2. I just saw this today and wondered if the top and bottom could be changed to 5 beads with the 3rd bead popped out. It looks like there would be enough room on the sides. I’m fairly new to this.

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    Replies
    1. I haven't tried that but there's no reason why you can't give your idea a try and see what happens. Having said that, using fewer beads than called for and pulling them closer together in the center might cause the motifs to warp.

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