Concrete Pendant

Concrete jewelry is fun, durable, and versatile.

The best way to start casting concrete jewelry is with pendants because they are easy to do and quite forgiving to paint. If you mess up (which I did several times with these ones) just let the paint dry and paint over it with a new layer. If all else fails, cover it in glitter.

Here is an easy Instructable to help get you started.

The item you will need are:

Concrete (I used ShapeCrete)

Silicone Molds

Cooking Spray

Eye pins

Felt

Acrylic paint/glitter paint

Craft pliers

O-Rings

A mixing bowl

A plastic spoon

Dust mask

Rubber gloves

Rubber cement

For this project I wanted to use my ShapeCrete. If you have never used it before I highly recommend checking out the website and grabbing yourself a tub. It is loads of fun and easy to use for big or small projects.

This is a small project, but I'll make a larger one later.

For pouring into a mold, mix ShapeCrete to water at a ration of 3:1.

Do this only in a well ventilated room and with a dust mask and rubber gloves on.

It should be the consistency of a thick milkshake when fully mixed.

*******DO NOT pour the leftover cement down the drain, or rinse off anything with cement on it. When it dries it will become solid and destroy your pipes. Wait until it dries completely and dispose of it as a solid*****

I have several silicon molds I thought would make cute pendants. The molds are for candy pours that I purchased at my local craft store. I've seen similar ones in Walmart and of course on Amazon. They are great for this project because the silicon bends easily and holds up well.

Spray a release into the molds. I used cooking spray.

Using a small plastic spoon, pour each mold half full.

When all the molds are (half) filled, gently tap the sides to release any large bubbles trapped in the cement.

Don't worry too much about the uneven look of the cement in the molds. It is liquid and will settle itself.

Let the cement dry at least overnight. I have an extremely short attention span and forgot about mine for 3 days...

To release the molds, set them upside down and push the bottom while gently peeling back the silicone from the sides.

I still had some residue from the cooking spray on my molded pendants, so I washed them with dish soap and warm water then dried them thoroughly.

Paint the pendants with acrylic paint.

My hamburger and pizza where painted to look like a standard hamburger and pepperoni pizza.

The dinosaurs where each painted a flat color. Yellow for the T-Rex, blue for the Triceratops, and green for the Brontosaurus (?)... Then each was painted with a second layer of matching glitter paint.

After the paint dries, apply a thin layer of high gloss acrylic sealer.

Let dry.

To turn the little cement pieces into pendants we need to attach a bale to each one.

Lay a silver colored eye pin on top of some black felt. Brush a layer of rubber cement unto the backside of each pendant, one at a time, and press them firmly into the felt. Make sure to cover the long end of the eye pin and leave the loop exposed at the top of the pendant.

When the rubber cement is completely dry, cut out the pendants.

Using small craft pliers open a silver colored O-Ring and attach it to the loop of each eye pin. This will be your bale.

Now that the pendants have bales, they will fit on almost any chain and choker. I've attached some examples of how to wear them on different types of necklaces.

The flying Brontosaurus was a happy accident. The eye pin was not centered properly, so he looks like he's being joyfully propelled through the sky. Especially when being worn over a tie dyed (cloud) shirt...