Finally! I have discovered the secret to making a DIY beaded watch band and I am loving them! I have been wanting to bead watch bands for my Apple watch for a long time but I hadn't seen anything anywhere like what I had in mind. I wasn't even sure if beaded watch bands with Delica beads were even possible. All I could find were bands that were made with large beads and looked more like a bracelet. Finally, I saw a post in a Facebook bead group of exactly what I wanted. The secret is the slider piece that slides into the ends of the Apple watch.
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The sliders can be purchased on Amazon in packs of 4. I purchased rose gold since that's the color of my watch. Next, you will need to figure out what kind of clasp you want for your beaded watch band. I like my watch to fit snug. I also have arthritis in my hands so I need something simple to close. The answer for me was magnetic fold over clasps I found on Etsy. I would recommend the fold over type because they add another level of protection against coming apart. The straight magnetic type comes apart too easily and the last thing you want to lose is your watch!
Now that I have a way to attach my band to my watch and a way to clasp the band shut that is easy for me, the real fun starts in deciding what I want the actual band to look like.
A quick tour around Etsy shows a couple of options, but I'm not really feeling inspired yet. So I decide to start simple with stripes. Since it's peyote stitch, those stripes are diagonal.
Half of my wardrobe is mint green/aqua so this was an obvious color choice.
A quarter of my wardrobe is turquoise so that was the next color. My first stab at the design had too much white, so I re-beaded the watch band making the white diagonal lines turquoise instead.
The clasp for the blue band had a wider base than the green band clasp, (the holes are farther apart). I just didn't like the way the Delicas looked snugged up to the clasp, so I added some size 8 seed beads between the last row of Delicas and the clasp.
As I stated previously, I like my watch to fit tight (and I have small wrists) so it takes some trial and error to get the bands to the length required to get the fit you want with the clasp you are using. You will notice that one side might be a little longer than the other side. Once I got the fit how I wanted it, there was no way I was ripping them out to even up the lengths. You can't tell that they are uneven when it's on the wrist anyway.
Next came the coral band.
Then came the black and white band.
If you are new to peyote beading, you might be wondering how to attach the band to the slider.
Step 1
Pull the band through the opening in the slide. I made the bands 16 columns wide.
If you will notice on the slider, the middle "dot" is black on one side and silver on the other side. The silver side is the back side. This is important because when the beads are wrapped around and joined up to make a circle, the pattern is not going to match up exactly so you want this break in the pattern to be on the back side so that it is not noticeable.
Step 2
Join the bead edge to the band forming a circle around the slider. Weave through the beads joining the two sides together. I left a very long tail when I started so that I could do this step with the thread that was already there.
Step 3
Pull the thread tight and finish off by weaving it through the rows of beads.
The beaded watch bands are super quick and easy to make. You can probably adapt a few of your peyote bracelet patterns, just mark out a section that is 16 columns wide by the length needed for your wrist.
Just a note about wearing the bands: Remember that Delica beads are not colorfast. If your watch band is tight on your wrist like mine is, the colors will come off if you sweat or get it wet.