Just Add Ribbon...

I am all about taking unwanted pieces of jewelry and turning them into a completely different piece—that the owner loves! While I’ve done lots of those lately, I recently discovered a little trick, which I found here. This is a whole lot faster than making a brand new piece and requires absolutely no jewelry-making knowledge.

When my sister recently gave me a couple of her extra long necklaces to upcycle however I wanted, I immediately told her what I could do with them—and she wanted them back once she saw what I did. :) My grandmother also "donated" the green pearl-like necklace to me, which my sister also became the owner of once I did this to it.

The originals are totally wearable on their own:

Two long, beaded strands

One long strand of black beads

Same style as the black, except lovely, crinkly green beads

But this little change preserves the original piece and gives you two looks from one piece of jewelry!

All you need is a long necklace, without a clasp on it, and two long lengths of ribbon. I would say at least a yard long each, but once you see how long you want it, you can trim it accordingly—just leave enough length to easily tie the bow.

Double or triple the necklace and slide one ribbon through each end of the necklace. Then tie the ribbon around your neck, letting the now-layered necklace hang as short or long as you want. If that sounds confusing, the pictures should help.

You can tie it short or long.

Just leave the ribbons long enough to work for different lengths.

So simple!

Now that I’ve seen the idea, it seems like a no-brainer! And now that I did these for my sister, I want to do it with some of my own jewelry!

Two looks, thanks to some ribbon. Not bad!

Enjoy trying this out yourself. It can make some of your forgotten pieces new favorites!