Bead Woven Mixtape Pendant

It was the other day, that I read a modern crossstitch magazin and found a page with stitches mix tapes, that's when the idea came up to transfer it to beads an make a statement mix tape pendant :-)

Unfortunately my weaving loom was gone during the years so I needed to make a simple new one.

For the loom:

• empty (shoe) box
• cutter knife
• glue
• ruler

For the weaving

• black thread
• thing long needle
• beads in prefered color
• cross stich pattern (design by lord libidan from xstitch magazine)

stiff silver band for final wearing

Actually you could buy a bead weaving loom out of wool for little money. I used to have one when I was a kid, but during the moving it must have been lost, so I decided to build a quick and easy one which is suitable for my belongings.

1. Measure your empty shoe box and mark the prefered weaving width, in my case 8cm (~3.25'')
2. Mark every 2mm.
3. cut markings to a depth of 5mm.
4. Mark and cut diagonally down.
5. Mark and scratch lighly the length sides of the box, approx. in the middle.
6. Cut the diagonal part in the middle and fold the length sides slightly.
7. glue to the front and the back side with an distance of about 3cm (~1'') from the top of the sides to the top of the front and the back. This diagonally cut and glued sides inforce the sides and prevent the front and the back side from overtightening.

The weaving process is very simple if you follow the following rules:

1. Secure your weaving yarn (approx. 1m/1' doubled) with a knot at the first yarn track.
2. Thread the first row of pearls on your needle and the thread.
3. Set the beaded thread BELOW your weaving track yarn.
4. Hold with your left hand in place (=> 1 bead between 2 yarn thread)
5. Thread your needle back through the beads, but this time ABOVE the tracking yarn.
6. Tighten and secure with a single knot at the end of the first bead row.
7. Continue with the second row and so on...

As you can see, I used the crossstitch pattern in two ways. Since the cross stitch is a square stitch and the beads are more rectangular, I wanted to see which dimensions I would prefer.

So in the first case my mix tape is stretched and in the second it seems compressed.

The original pattern is 13:21 so a ratio of approx. 1,6. The stretched pendent has a ratio of approx. 2,4. I calculated at which bead ratio I would get a "square" bead pixel, but in my case instead of 1 bead I would have needed 4x5 and then the pendant would suit better for a shopping bag :-)

So I decided for the stretched one and secured it.

1. Secure your weaving ends.
2. Cut your tracking yarn.
3. Tie a knot with the first and the second thread.
4. Tie then a knot with the the second and the third.
5. Continue until all threads are knotted.
6. Secure the thread ends with sewing into the pendant.

Adding the loops

1. Thread 10 beads on and thread trough them again to receive a loop.
2. Sew the loop to the upper left corner of your mix tape.
3. Repeat with the other side.

I like how the pendant turned out, and I'm already looking forward to wear it next weekend :-)