As I get more involved in beading bracelets I find myself struggling with the proper length. I'm little and my wrists are in proportion to my body so its hard to use my wrists as a sizing guideline. How long do you usually make your bracelets? I'd really appreciate a better frame of reference because 7 inches seems to be too small for the average size berson.
Typically a bracelet size would be 1" greater than an adult person's wrist, occasionally I use 1.25" if a loser fit is desired. I found http://www.how-to-make-beaded-jewelry.com/bracelet-size-guide.html when I started making jewellery, it gives both rough lengths for adult and children sized bracelets. Hope that helps.
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Most of the sites I've been on just say to use your own wrist which doesn't work unless i'm making a child size bracelet! Thank you for the link! I guess 7 inches is right even though it really doesn't feel that way.
When making the bracelet, don't forget to take in the size of the bead. If you use a 6mm bead, the size will be considerably smaller than using 10mm beads.
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Bracelet lengths have gotten bigger over the years. I used to sell vintage jewelry and 6-1/4" was a standard at one time, currently bracelets are 7-1/2" or 8" as a rule. As shanks noted, if the beads are largish and bulky, the length to go around needs to be increased. I am like you and have a small wrist and if I make a bracelet strictly by a pattern and it is for me, it usually needs to be shortened. Donna
Thanks. I didn't know about the larger beads essentially making the bracelet smaller although now that i think about it that does seem sort of obvious.7 7-1/2 just seems like its so big!
I also have little wrists. I'm 5'6" and my wrist is 5 3/4. I'm not a little girl otherwise- I dont dare check my hips, im sure I don't want to know the answer. The funny part is my hands are really big- so a bangle needs to be 9" in inside diameter to fit over my hand. Go figure.
More important than measuring length is to make sure you are measuring the INSIDE DIAMETER- not the lenght of the overall bracelet laid flat. Lets say you use some big 1" beads, then you have to figure its 1/2" from the string to the bead edge on the radius, radius x2x pie is the circumfrence (who said geometry was useless) and you loose a lot of space on the inside of the completed piece.
I hear complaints on both sides, so if you are making jewelry for sale- do both. Make one at 6.5 and make one just under 8. Make sure you label them something like "petite" and "average" Or "girls" and "ladies" No one likes the word large. For a friend or as a gift, it gets harder... I would shoot for 7 if I had to pick. People with small wrists will be used to them being large and people with larger wrists are used to them being tight.
Just wanted to straighten out Shanks answer and mine- at first I thought shank was wrong, saying a bigger bead will be a bigger bracelete.... but now I get it.
if you make a bracelet by counting how many beads to use, a bracelette made with 10mm beads WILL be longer than a bracelet made with the exact same number of beads that are 6mm.
HOWEVER.. if you have a 7" length of bracelette made with 10mm beads and a 7" length of bracelete made with 6mm beads the larger beads will take up more of the inside space once you turn it into a circle, so the inside diameter on the 10mm will be SMALLER than the exact same bracelette made with 6mm beads. The smaller bead takes up less of the inside space, so the inside diameter will be LARGER with a SMALLER bead if the overall length of core thread is the same. Make sense?
Thanks for sharing the link.As i am beginner in making jewelry this link would of great help for me.