Strand Bands Designer Set Review

The Make 2 Wear Strand Bands Designer Set, is a 62 piece jewellery making set allowing children to create their own bespoke fashion bracelets using colourful bands and beads.

With assorted stretchable, rubber strand bands in various colours, an assortment of beads and charms and a Strand Styler tool and suction cup, there is enough contents to make up to fifteen bracelets in various designs.

The set comes with instructions, but they are quite vague and even 12 year old Kezia and big sister Ella were getting a bit irate and frustrated trying to work out how to make a bracelet. The overly simplified 'fold, knot, peel apart' instructions didn't really help them. So we took to the trusty internet and found some video tutorials on YouTube, which proved a great help.

Once we understood the basic technique, the strands were cut to size, knotted, attached to the top of the Strand Styler, separated into sections and plaited or knotted. The Strand Styler keeps the strands secured together, making working with the materials less fiddly. However, the stretchy strands can ping off, unravel or get twisted up quite easily if you aren't careful, which proves quite frustrating when you're half way through making a bracelet. Practice definitely helps with the techniques and eventually, the girls managed to work out how to make the simple braided bracelets.The ends are then tied off to secure the bracelet to the wrist.

For creative kids, with patience and dexterity, the set will enable them to make a range of cool looking bracelets.There are various different techniques for attaching the beads and charms and lots of ways to knot the strands, making a huge variety of possible bracelet designs. The colours of the strands can be mixed and matched to suit individual tastes and the thickness of the threads can be decided when peeling the strands apart, changing the visual effect of the braiding. The beads and charms are funky, for a variety of looks and styles from punk rock to girly.

The set is aimed at girls aged 6 and up.  I'm sure there might be some girls of that age that may be able to make some wearable pieces with some assistance, but it's not the easiest process as my girls found out. I'd recommend it for children older than this, if you want them to work on their bracelet making skills independently.

Some advanced techniques look very complicated indeed, but I'm sure they can be attempted once the simpler techniques are mastered.  However, I'd definitely recommend using YouTube tutorials rather than the instruction leaflet. Seeing the process in action made the whole thing make much more sense.

You can use your imagination to create your own individual designs using the braiding and beading techniques learned, reusing the Strand Styler tool. The end results look pretty good and with practice, I'm sure they will get even better.

The Strand Bands Designer Set is £19.99 RRP. Find the instructional videos on YouTube.

       

Shrink Design Jewellery

MyStyle Craft Design & Make Shrink Design Jewellery from Interplay is a craft activity that uses shrink plastic as a medium for making ultra trendy and edgy accessories. Seven pieces of jewellery can be created including angel wing earrings and a text necklace. The full colour instruction booklet teaches the techniques required, and there are enough of the materials to make your own additional pieces.

The technique you use to make the jewellery is quite simple.  You choose a design from the booklet and trace it onto the shrink plastic sheet, colour it in and cut it out. Using the hole punch, you make a hole which will be used to thread the charm onto the string or jump ring.  Once the charm is prepared, you pop it into the oven on a cardboard sheet at 160 degrees for just a couple of minutes until it shrinks down.  Once cooled down, you can use the charm to make jewellery using the other components included in the kit.

The finished charms were really cute and the colours concentrated to make them look very impressive.  The shrinking process makes them thick and sturdy and ideal to use on necklaces, bracelets and earrings.  Kizzy also made some of her own designs and created some of her own accessories including a beaded phone charm with my name on it!

My favourite thing that she created was a necklace inspired by Daryl Dixon of The Walking Dead fame.  It has a Zombie charm along with the angel wings that Daryl has on the back of his waistcoat, attached to a cord with jump rings.  I loved it. It looked really professional and very cool!

The angel wings also featured on a pair of earrings that looked really stunning and unique.  There is an additional downloadable PDF, which has extra designs including cute cupcakes, ice creams, lettering and a moustache.

I was impressed at just how many pieces could be made using the shrink plastic sheets, clasps, beads, cord, rings and earring hooks. Kizzy was able to work independently and really enjoyed the creativity that this kit allowed her.

At £9.99 it is a great value set, which makes plenty of charms and finished jewellery pieces.  It is aimed for girls aged 8 and over and would be a lovely way for them to make handmade gifts for their friends this Christmas.

Find out more at www.interplayuk.com/mystyle/shrink-design-jewellery.