Paper Quilling Earrings Tutorial – Triangle Whirl

One of my favorite tools for making quilled jewelry is the border buddy.  It allows you to make different sized open bordered circles, squares, and triangles like this:

If you haven’t used the border buddy yet, make sure to click here to read all about the tips and tricks for using it.

If you don’t have a border buddy, but you still want to make today’s earrings, no problem!  Click here to read all about how to make the shapes without a border buddy.

The first earrings I made with the Border Buddy are the triangle swirl and square swirl earrings, which I already have tutorials for on the blog.    You can also look here and here for more earrings on the blog that use the border buddy.

Today I have a new step by step paper quilling earrings tutorial for you! I got the idea for these new triangle whirl earrings a long time ago, and finally got the time to try them out last month.  I was thrilled that my idea worked!

Supplies You Need (for one pair of earrings):

• 2 strips of paper 24″ long (if you make a smaller or larger triangle you may need a shorter or longer strip of paper)
• glue (My favorite is PPA which you can find at Custom Quilling, or here on Amazon)
• Border Buddy by Quilled Creations (you can find it at Custom Quilling and onAmazon)
• Thin dowel and/or needle quilling tool – you could also use a toothpick
• sealant for making your earrings water resistant (click here to read more about different sealants)

Instructions:

• This design is quite simple once you follow a few good tips for using the Border Buddy.  If you haven’t already, check out my first post on tips for using the Border Buddy!  You will be wrapping each of the strips around a certain layer on the Border Buddy.  If you have numbered the layers on your Border Buddy, it will be easier to keep track of which layer you are on.  My number 1 layer is the biggest layer.   Make sure as you are wrapping, you apply glue all around the border as you go, to keep a nice sturdy triangle shape.  Just be sure to wrap very carefully so the edges line up or you’ll end up with the edges looking uneven.  I apply glue to two sides at a time to make it a bit quicker. *note* these photos are obviously of the square tip for the border buddy, you will be using the triangular one for these earrings.

• Wrap each 24″ strip around level 1 of the triangular Border Buddy.  Let it dry completely, this is very important!  Then using your fingers bend each corner a little bit as shown in the right photo below. 

• Then take a small dowel (I am using one of the bamboo quilling forms from Little Circles) to further bend each corner as shown.

• If you would like it even more curled you can use the skinny tip of a slotted or needle quilling tool to bend it even more.  The reason for the gradual bending and not just using a skinny tool right away is because it helps the paper layers keep shape better.  If you bend too quickly the layers can come apart and not look very nice.

• Earlier I mentioned that you need to wait until your triangle is completely dry before trying to bend the corners.  This is why! If you try to bend and your triangle is not completely dry, the layers will come apart so easily and your shape will not look nice!

• Once your shapes are ready, it’s time to put on the sealant!  Paint a bit of sealant onto your shape, wait for a few minutes while it dries, and then bend the corners to reshape it.  The corners will come undone a bit after you put on the sealant.  For the sealant I used Ceramcoat All Purpose Sealer (click here for a full review with tips on how to use it)

• Here on the left you can see a piece after it has sealant and is reshaped.  The one on the right has not been reshaped yet.  You can’t wait too long, just long enough for the sealant to dry a little bit.

• And here are two finished pieces!  Wait for them to completely dry, then paint the other side with sealant.  Attach them to jump rings and earwires and then paint the whole thing with a layer of topcoat/glaze (I used 3D Crystal Lacquer for this pair. Other good ones are Diamond Glaze and PPA gloss, or PPA matte if you want your piece to stay matte like paper.  Click here to read all about those and other sealants and topcoats with reviews and tips.  After you paint on your topcoat let your earrings hang to fully dry.  In the meantime, grab more paper and make another pair!

As you can see this is a smallish size earring, just nice for being noticeable but not a huge statement earring.

Stick around and check out some of the other fun stuff on the blog!

• Click here to view more free paper quilling tutorials!
• Click here to view paper quilling tips and tricks!
• Click here to view a list of places to buy quilling supplies around the world!
• Click here to view some of my own quilling projects, with tips so you can make your own if you’d like!

*All products and supplies mentioned in this post I purchased and/or made on my own.

*This post contains some affiliate links, and some non affiliate links.  If you purchase products through the affiliate links I get a small percentage (at no extra cost to you!).  I only link to products that I believe in and/or love to use myself.  Thank you for supporting my blog!