Ask the Experts Bracelet Q&A

I have a bracelet I made out of large chunks of turquoise and spaced out with much smaller coral and bronze beads. The problem is that my arm hairs get pinched really badly, even though I tried to leave some room for the beads to move around. Is there a trick to knowing how much room to leave so the beads can move without pinching?

- Danielle

This may sound strange, but often looser styles of beads can actually pinch skin and hair worse than tightly strung bracelets or necklaces. Some suggestions to help with this include reducing the excess movement of the beads by tightening the beads up in the strand, switching to a different stringing material (e.g. beading wire, silk, nylon, chain, etc.) or using small beads to fill in the gaps on large-hole beads so they have less room to move around. One last suggestion is to consider using different shaped beads for your bracelet design, as often beads with flat sides, like cube beads, will pinch when pulled together in an arc shape.

- Maura Buckner, Jewelry-Making Expert