Vipera

Green and Black Seed Bead Fringe Earrings

Skill LevelIntermediate

TechniqueSeed-Beading

Approximate Size5 1/4 Inches

These earrings definitely have sway! You can modify the pattern to make these earrings wider, narrower, shorter, or longer. Have fun with them and come up with something completely different. author signature

Artbeads Designer Seed Bead Blends offer beautiful color combinations to inspire your designs. Cheri used our Black Jade Blend along with fire-polished beads and bugle beads in these fun fringe earrings. She used the colors in the Blend to inspire her color choices for the other beads in the design. You can see more inspiration for using some of our Seed Bead Blends in this Artbeads Cafe episode.

Step-by-Step Instructions Expand All Steps

Create a decreasing brick stitch triangle using seed beads from the Artbeads Black Jade Designer Blend. Take a look at our Vipera PDF Diagram for the color pattern to use on each row. You'll also find variations on width and length of the brick stitch triangle.

Vipera PDF Diagram
Brick Stitch Diagram
Basic Brick Stitch Text Tutorial
Decreasing and Increasing Brick Stitch Text Tutorial
Brick Stitch Video Tutorial

Finish your thread at the point of the triangle, leaving a tail long enough to add the earring later.

Bead Weaving Basics: Starting, Adding, and Ending Thread

Before beginning your fringe, you will want to iron the thread you use, so the fringe doesn't curl up at all. We used a synthetic material for our beading thread, so we used a warm iron on a very low setting. Using a setting that is too high could melt synthetic threads.

Add a new ironed thread to create your first row of fringe and make sure the thread is coming out of one of the end seed beads in the first row of the triangle. Using the PDF diagram as a reference, add the first row of fringe. Remember, you can play with the length and pattern of your fringe, as the variations in our diagram show. Also note that we used TOHO 15/0 bead rounds in opaque shiny jet black before and after every Miyuki 6mm metallic forest green iris bugle bead and before and after every 4mm fire-polished bead in jet in the fringe.

After you've added your last bead in the first row of fringe (a 15/0 seed bead), go back through the fire-polished bead and every bead before that in the row. Bring your thread up through a couple of beads in the brick stitch before going back down and out of the next bead over in the last row of brick stitch. When creating your fringe, you don't want to pull too tight, but you also don't want the fringe too loose, as that will leave gaps between the beads. With your thread coming out of the bead for the next row of fringe (but before adding any beads for the next row of fringe), adjust the tension so that the beads hang just right. Make sure to check your tension consistently as you add your rows of fringe.

Keep adding fringe coming out of each bead in the last row of brick stitch in the same manner as before. You will use the same thread for each fringe until you run out of length. Then, just add a new thread (make sure it's ironed). When you've added the last row of fringe, secure and trim your thread within the brick stitch triangle.

Use the tail at the top of your brick stitch triangle to attach the gunmetal-plated lever-back earring to the triangle. Secure and trim the thread.

Repeat steps 1-7 to create the other earring.

List of Components
Artbeads Black Jade Designer Blend, TOHO 11/0 Round Seed Beads (ADB0468, qty 1)
TOHO Bead Round 11/0 Opaque Shiny Jet Black (TBRD11-49, qty 1)
Fire-Polished Bead 4mm Jet (100pc Pack) (FPS-JET4, qty 1)
TOHO Bead Round 15/0 Opaque Shiny Jet Black (TBRD15-49, qty 1)
Miyuki 6mm Metallic Forest Green Iris Bugle Beads 5-Inch Tube (BEADS-3821, qty 1)
Gunmetal-Plated Lever-back Earring (BGM-EAR02, qty 1)
KO Nylon Japanese Beading Thread 55 yd Spool - Black (STRNG-0116, qty 1)

PRINT THIS PAGE

Add all available items to your cart at once or edit the quantities below. Any items with quantities lower than stated minimums will default to the minimum in your cart.

Nice choice! All or most of the products needed for this project are shown below with quantities. Sometimes we sell out of components and aren’t able to order more from the manufacturer (we know, it is very disappointing to us, too). Use the opportunity to mix up the design and make it yours by substituting similar products or altering the entire color scheme—it’s up to you!