Make Bead and Wire Flower Hair Jewelry

This beaded flower is made on a single piece of wire and can easily be used as an ornament or addition to any of your designs in various sizes and colors. The stiffness of your flower will depend on the thickness of the wire you use. I like 26 gauge wire the best, but I don't keep it in many colors, so most of my flowers are made using 24 or 28 gauge wire. Basically, you string all of your beads onto the spool of wire first, wrap the petals, then cut.

The flower is suitable for beginners and will take about 15 minutes to make.

Wire
24, 26, 28 gauge are all good choices

Beads
I used size 11 Matsuno seed beads and a 6-mm glass pearl

Hair Pin or Bobby Pin
You can decorate almost anything with these flowers!

Wire Cutters
I used flush cutters

Here's a photo of the materials needed to make a flower. You will need to decide how many petals your flower will have (probably want 7 or less... 4-5 looks great) and how big to make a petal. If you like, you can simply string a lot of beads onto your wire and start wrapping loops by eyeing their size, continuing until your flower is made. Personally, I start by stringing on some beads and twisting the wire around until I get a size petal I like. Then I count the beads and remove them from the wire. I string on a center bead (optional) and then the number of petals multiplied by the number of beads needed to make the petal. In this case, I made 5 petals, each with 15 beads for a total of 75 seed beads (yes, I'm a perfectionist). I twisted a loop at the end of the wire to keep the beads from falling off the wire.

Move down from the end of the wire before wrapping the first petal. I like to keep 4-6" of bare wire. Slide the beads for one petal (e.g., 15 beads) down to within 4-6" of the wire end. Cross the wire around and twist the beads to form a loop (not wrapping the wire around the base of the beads, which would be less secure). One hand was holding the wire ends and I grasped the beads with the other hand to twist the loop. I twisted twice to form a complete wrap, but once is probably enough.

Slide the beads for the next petal down to your first petal. Cross the spool wire around to where the first petal was formed.

Pull the wire on the spool side so that there are no gaps in the beads of the second petal. Hold the beads from the second petal in your fingers and twist them around (just like for the first petal!).

Repeat for the rest of your petals. Some people like to snug their petals up right next to each other and others like to leave some space between them or leave beads between the petals. Feel free to experiment.

Here's what my flower looks like with five petals. You may decide your flower is finished at this point. If so, simply straighten the wires and cut them to the desired length. Wrap the wires around the bended portion of a hairpin or bobby pin and trim their ends. Make several flowers and decorate a barrette or headband!

There are lots of ways to make a center. Here, I slid a pearl down the wire toward the petals. Instead of twisting the wire, I ran it around the back of the opposite petal. This secured my flower. I pulled the wires together and cut them so that they would be even. You can shape the petal to give the flower a cup shape. Overlapping the petals gives a nice effect, too.