Button Bangles

The Button bangles have been on my little jewelry scene since last year when I re-found up a box filled with old buttons and was stymied about how to show them off. They all belonged to my Great Auntie Doris (See previous post for a picture of her and her sisters...they were quite the threesome) and started me off collecting buttons in earnest. OK, obsessively. After playing around with charm-style bracelets, i came upon the idea of using memory wire to keep the buttons rigid, and allow for more "presentation" of the buttons. It has worked really beautifully and they are some of my most popular pieces. I usually stat by cutting out a foot long section, wiring one end closed with a loop (using round nosed pliers) and then I string on the button in my desired design. This actually takes longer than you might expect because the buttons have to sit comfortably with each other - I don't like to have a lot of the wire showing through - it looks kind of unfinished. Sometimes I add in a locket or some beads, but I try to keep the theme consistent - metal, brightness, glass...but with a few surprises to keep things vibrant. Once I have them all set (Usually on average about 35 buttons - which is a lot of vintage/antique buttons) I make another very tight loop and wire them together - trying to hide the loop in between larger buttons. I make my bangles about 8 inches in diameter, and they seem to fit 7.5 inch wrists just fine.