Jewelry Box: DIY Tom Binns colored crystals

This DIY, inspired by the neon Tom Binns crystal necklaces, has been floating around the interwebs for quite a while now, and I had all the tools to make it a go, but I never did it. Until the other night. This is not hard or time-consuming, but I just needed the motivation. I'm so glad I did it, though, because I'm loving the result!

I bought two of those tacky crystal necklaces from the dollar store a while back (maybe over the summer when this DIY was first making the blog rounds?) and then I attached the bottom to the top one by cutting the chain and attaching the hooks so that the drape looked nice and even.

Then I had to decide on which nail polish colors to use! (No way I was using Sharpies. That would have been too time-consuming. haha) I teetered between using a reds and oranges, but I ultimately decided on a pale green, dark green, and baby blue. (I'll update with color names this evening, sorry!) And then I just let my OCD-pattern-making brain go to town! Everything had to be symmetrical for me, of course, but I bet it would look great with the colors a bit lopsided, too!

 

I like how the pale blue blends in with the chambray shirt. The necklace also got a lot of play over a black t-shirt dress while dancing my tail feather off at Los Feliz on Saturday night. The contrast with the black was a nice touch.

Need more precise directions on how to paint each crystal? Be careful not to load up the nail polish brush with too much lacquer otherwise it will overwhelm the crystal and glob it up. I put a little dot on each crystal in the more opaque colors and let gravity pull it down the sides; but with the pale green, I did a couple of coats with a sparse brush.

Check out how these other bloggers worked their neon magic! Strange Fruit, The Hyperbalist, Little Pink Monster, Sugar Rock Catwalk, and Corvus Noir. (Also, I love the neon safety pins on this one: Crochet Clouds.)