Swarvoski Embellished Hairband

If you wanted me too, I could give you my life history in hairbands - all you have to do is ask!  This one will go down as the one that gave me my sparkle back. If you've read my blog for a length of time you may remember that a post about embellishing was never far away. The arrival of two small children pushed the need to embellish to a back corner of my mind but since discovering Swavorski crystals are available to buy at retail rather than wholesale things are about to get sparkly once again.

Just before Christmas I attended a Swarvoski evening hosted by the lovely Christine Leech of Sew Yeah, (she made this beautiful hairband which was such a treat to embellish) at Tea and Crafting in Covent Garden.  Getting to play with all the jewels is my kind of good time. I did spend most of the evening chatting which is why I only finished this last week but it was so interesting finding out more about the company and their processes. I've become increasingly aware about the materials I'm using in my projects - I've always reused and recycled but selecting materials which do less environmental damage and are traceable is becoming more and more important to me. Swarovski crystals are still made in Austria and I've love the fact that there is a full sustainabilty section on their website. 

Onto the make, I used a hairband kindly made and provided on the evening so I don't have an exact tutorial for the base but I did make this fabric hairband back in my blogs early years if you want to make one (I still wear it loads). If not there are sooo many hairbands around to buy these days - choose one which has loose fabric so you can stitch the jewels on.  For the design I decided to cluster my jewels on just one side of the hairband picking out the blues and turquoise of the pattern with stones, to provide some contrast I used beautiful star shape crystals and then dotted hotfix stars around the main pattern.  I always like to stitch my jewels as it means I can reuse in the future, I'd definitely recommend a hotfix gun, if you don't have one, fear not, E6000 glue will stick the stars on just as well. I've linked the crystals and the settings below but use them as a guide and let all the gorgeous colours inspire you - happy making!x 

I used...

5 x Pear Shape, Crystal Mint - Crystal setting

5 x Cushion Shape, Crystal Summer Blue - Crystal setting 

4 x Star Crystal, Golden Shadow - Crystal setting

10 x Hotfix Flatback Star, Crystal Golden Shadow

A huge thanks to Christine, Jane and The Swarovski team for providing the materials for this project. Words, styling and photography all me.