Chainmaille Watch Band in Oops Weave

I've long had an obsession with watch bands, handmade watch band, that is, of course!

Back in my bead weaving days, I made a free form (mostly peyote-based) watch band, in many shades and shapes of blue beads.  That tickled me for a very long time!  Got it?  A long "time"?!! :-)

Fast forward.  Watch bands have also been a popular application (hey, an app!) for chainmaille.  Those tiny rings are perfect attachment to any watch face with mini tension bars for changing watch bands.

Just about any basic chainmaille weaves can be used for watch bands, with the key being a weave that is dense but low profile, flexible but sturdy.  As I searched and researched, the winner in my book is still my all time favorite, Oops!  AKA, European 4 in 1 Unbalanced.

Oops weave is very fluid, fabric-like, yet very strong to stand up to daily wear and tear.

Speaking of daily wear, for the band closure, I selected a 5-point tube slider for easy on and off.  The slider also has a small magnet built inside the ends of the tube to help "guide and attract" the opposite end in place.

Oh, and I love this nice and BIG watch face, with BIG numbers.  Yes, it measures over 1 1/2" across.  With all this surface area, it's only 1/4" in thickness.  Not ultra thin, but thin and light weight enough to fit comfortably over the wrist.

The total length for the watch and band is right at 7", with the Oops band at 1" wide, and the tube slider closed at 1 1/8" wide.  The Oops band can be slightly lengthened at 3/16" increment to fit a bigger wrist.

The metal used for the chainmaille band is bright aluminum, a light weight, no maintenance metal.  The material of the tube slider is plated in platinum color.  The watch face has a stainless steel case, acrylic window, with quartz movement.

For complete view of the watch/band, please visit my Picasa album here.

Bollywood by way of Byzantine

If you already speak Maillese (yep, that's a word now, in my dictionary), you may think, "Byzantine? Where?"  Ahh, but they're there; see them?  This is a version of the Staggered Byzantine family that hit the sweet spot right in between Staggered Byzantine Halves and Sheet.  So maybe, a one-row sheet? Hee hee...

Even if you're not a maille-head, I hope you'll still find this bracelet a joy to hold and wear, just for the pure delight of the curves, the colors, and the gentle hug on your wrist.

Made of small, light weight bright aluminum jump rings, the frame work of the bracelet alone is no small feat, consisting of over 480 jump rings, while remaining flexible and almost elastic.

For as much as I believe less is more, sometimes, more is just so much better:-)  I could never resist adding pops of colors here and there.  And if you don't mind me saying, the random combination of red and gold beads adds an opulent, exotic flair.  Can you say, Bollywood?!!! :-)

Specs:

Rings: BA, from TRL, 19 swg, 9/64" ID.

Beads: Faceted glass cylinder beads, strung on SoftFlex wire.

Clasp: 3-point tube slider.

The bracelet measures at 7 3/4" long, just a tad shy of 1" wide, low side-profile at 3/16" thick.

This item is available for purchase or special order in my online studio DaisyKreates.com.

Custom orders welcome.  Please also note that use of different metals and beads may result in slightly different length and width, as well as clasp to accommodate the overall design.

More views available here.

Comments and critiques welcome.

Moorish Rose Cuff

Five days and five nights, that's how long it took me to finish this cuff, my first Moorish Rose, with beads!

Moorish Rose is a chainmaille weave that directly connects 6-ring mobius in sheet form, as first recorded by djgm on MailleArtisans.org.

A relatively straight forward idea, linking mobi to mobi, what's so difficult about it?  Not much, that's if you have a full understanding of mobius weave, which I don't...

But it's so pretty, and there's the detail, step-by-step, fantastic tutorial by Xander; I got to give it a try.  And that's over 5 days ago...

Here's what I ended up with, my first Moorish Rose cuff, with a red drop bead set in the center of every mobius.  Four-row, 1" wide, 7 1/2" long, closes with a 4-ring tube slider.

Not many other chainmaille bracelets took me this long to do.  Granted, a large part of the 5 days was about reading the tutorial, testing rings of various AR's and materials, taking rings apart, fixing mistakes, scouting the net for tips and tricks; but the tough part was the fact that there isn't many Moorish Roses out there; I literally had to piece clues together.

Ahh, but the result is worth it! I like the red beads, they always remind me of pomegranate seeds:-)  

Under bright lights, doesn't it look just like a work of stained glass?!

Specs:

Main body: TRL BA rings, 19 swg, 1/4" ID, actual AR is close to 6.9; a tad too big on their own, but perfect with inset beads; total of 20 columns, over 450 rings.

Clasp point: TRL BA, 19 swg, 3/16" ID, to even out the ends before attaching to the tube slider.

Beads: Glass beads, drop shape, top drilled hole, red with light AB coating, strung on SoftFlex wire.

OK, now that the prototype is done; next will be in stainless steel or niobium.  To be honest, BA is just too weak at this AR, but for testing purpose, works out just fine.

More pictures of the cuff?  Check them here.

W.H.I.B.U.T. - as of Feb. 7, 2012

Been a while since my last post; not that I've not been hard at work; the fact is, I hardly ever worked (hee, hee...)  I just play with rings, lots and lots of rings:-) Put one ring through a ring, around a ring, a few rings at a time, close the ring; and rinse and repeat and repeat, and repeat....



OK, here's the a closer-up of the Japanese family:

and here's part of the European family: