It’s been two years since Catriona Gray, Miss Philippines, was crowned Miss Universe 2018 – and in those two years I would have a small phase where I’d just go back and watch her highlights from the competition because her presence and charisma were breathtaking.
Sure I may be a bit biased because of my Filipino heritage, but literally look up Ne-Yo’s Miss Independence performance from that pageant on YouTube. From that alone you’d know: This woman was a force to be reckoned with.
Every time I go through the rabbit hole that is Catriona Gray, the one thing that never ceases to amaze me are her lava-inspired evening gown and her iconic ear pieces, with the Philippines Sun design.
I adore the ear cuff so much, I thought, it was time to try and make something like this myself. I am no professional jewelry maker — I’m a total amateur, and absolute beginner, so this is my most budget-friendly and simple approach to making this.
Materials & Tools
I actually played around with the materials and made three different types of ear cuffs, but I will only feature the one method that worked best for me. Most of the materials I already had, so the only thing I really bought was the spray paint and large paper clips (for this method).
- Paper clips: Both 22mm (owned) and 50 mm | Dollarama ($1.25 CAD ea.)
- Foam sheets (owned): Any colour, it may be painted over anyway, can choose metallic colours such as silver or gold for consistency | Dollarama (Foam pack: $3.25 CAD)
- Spray Paint (bought): Gold | Michaels (Reg.* $12.99 CAD)
- Scissors
- Ruler
- Hot glue gun
- Pliers (optional – if your scissors aren’t strong enough to cut your paper clips or if parts of the paper clip are hard to adjust/fold)
*Budget Tip: Michaels always has coupons – make sure you apply coupon for the best discounted value!
Steps
Hook
- Unfold large paper clip into a straight line, then into a hook-like shape
- Everyone’s ear is different; you can draw out the shape of the hook and use as reference, or you can shape the paper clip behind your ear for a more comfortable fit.
- Unfold small paper clip and make a small hook with the end wrapped around the big paper clip
- This is the hardest part for me
- Note: For the smaller hook, make sure it’s aligned with with your cartilage and not your earlobe. This was a tricky part because it was hard to hold in place. If need be, try and secure it with the hot glue gun/ crazy glue
Sun & Stars
Sun
I drew the sun in 3cm x 3cm measurements.
Draw out sun shape on your foam sheet
This is a loose example. Drawing is not the actual size, please measure accordingly.
- Draw an upside-down “T” as your base – both lines are 3cm each.
2. Draw the “roof” – make sure they meet 0.5 cm and 2.5 cm points of your ruler.
For exact measurements, mark 0.5 cm of the standing line from the top then mark points 0.5 cm apart across as shown in diagram.
3. Connect the ends of the roof to the base of the shape, meeting at the 1 cm and 2 cm points of your ruler.
4. Mark 0.5 cm from the corners, draw a line down at angle meeting the centre of the shape.
Cut out the entire shape, then make a slight cut inside the shape as shown in the diagram. Make sure to leave 0.5 cm of space at the bottom.
Make 4 of these – you can trace the shape 3 more times to make it easier and faster.
Stars
- Draw out 3 small stars – I free handed the stars.
Once you have completed all these steps, hot glue gun the pieces accordingly. End result should look something like this:
Colour
Once the glue is all dried up, apply a spray painted coat all over the ear cuff. There are instructions on how to use spray paint properly. I made sure all areas of Make sure you’re in a ventilated area when doing this so the smell doesn’t linger in your home. This process took about 30-40 minutes to dry on both sides.
Result
What I love about this method is that the hot glue gun works so well on the foam pieces and the spray paint made it look like the real deal.
There’s definitely a lot of room for improvement, but for a beginner using unorthodox materials for ear cuffs – not too shabby if I say so myself.
Let me know what you think, and if there are suggestions I can try it out for next time!
DIYWITHDANNIEE 