Cabochon necklace

I've recently been tryin cabochons in jewellery making. I've not used them before but I heard nail varnish works great so that's what I've been testing. I'm planin on tryin out some more ideas with them soon but here's how the nail varnish worked out...

Pick the nail varnish colours you want to use. I picked a purple & blue glitter and a pink , I also used black as I heard that made your other colours look more solid when looking though the stone (I wouldn't say it was nessessry now after doin it) 

The cabochon (left) needs to be placed face down for painting and you need to work backwards to how you would paint your nails. 

Add a square if masking tape to the rounded side and stick it down to make your painting a lot easier =) 

As were working backwards you should first paint what would be your top coat if it was your nails. So that would be the glitter!

Once you've done a couple if coats of glitter and it's dried add your main colour coat (pink) I would advise two coats =) 

Then add your black, supposedly to make a more solid look through the stone but like I said I wouldn't bother with this step again. 

 

Once your nail varnish is dry your cabochon stone us ready to mount and make into jewellery. I loved turning all my stones over to see how the nail varnish had worked with the different colours. 

Now your stones ready you just need to glue it down on to your mount. 

I used a simple all purpose glue, it seems to have worked fine it was easy to use and the stones are still stuck, and there's no mess to be seen through the stones. I'm not sure what else to recommend right now. I used two little drops and spread them on the mount. 

Fairly quickly you will need to gently position and lightly drop your stone into place, then press very gently to stick it down. Don't press too hard or your glue could squeeze out the sides and become messy!

Once dry your ready to go...

This is what you will need for making your stone into a long pendant necklace. 

(Top right) your tools which are for cutting, gripping and shaping. (Top left) your long chain, I used quite a fine chain. (Bottom left) These are your jump rings, you'll need one for the fastener to link on to and one for attaching your fastener to the chain. (Bottom right) These are your fasteners also known as lobster claws. 

Decide how long you want your necklace to be and then use the tools to cut one link in the chain. 

Grip one jump ring and use the tools to open your ring. By gripping both sides of the ring you can simply twist your wrist forward to open the ring. 

Slide your chain end on to your jump ring then using the same twist technique as above to close your ring. You can then use your flat gripping tool to press down flat on the ring just to make sure it's even and in line. 

Now slide your pendant on to the chain as once you've added the clasp you won't be able to slide the pendant on after. Then at the bare end of the chain add your clasp. Just like above twist open your jump ring and slide it on to the clasps ring and then on to the end link of the chain, then twist your ring shut and press it flat with the tools to make sure it even.