Japanese hair decoration - kanzashi

Lately, decorations kanzashi became fashionable not only in the countries of the rising sun, but also in many European countries, women began to become interested in the art of creating jewelry from satin ribbons. There are many techniques for folding ribbon to form petals for kanzashi flowers. In this article you will learn how to decorate a crocodile hairpin with your own hands using a simple technique.

You will need:
• Satin ribbons 5 cm wide in blue and white colors.
• Candle or lighter.
• Scissors.
• Moment glue is transparent.
• Ruler.
• Beads, rhinestones, decorative stones, anything for the center of the flower.
• Crocodile clip.
• Marker or felt-tip pen.
• Tweezers.
• Cardboard.
• Needle and thread.

Step one. Cut the ribbons into squares (21 blue, 10 white). Scorch the edges of the ribbon with fire to prevent it from unraveling.



Step two. Fold the ribbon squares as shown in the photo below, forming a petal. Scorch the junction of all corners and press with your fingers so that the workpiece does not fall apart.





Step three.Cut a circle out of cardboard, approximately 3 cm in diameter. Glue blue tape on both sides of the circle and singe the edges.



Step four. Glue the circle to the hairpin. To make it hold tighter, you can wrap the hairpin together with the circle with a strip of ribbon of the same color and glue it.



Step five. Now sew all the petals together. First string 6 white petals, and then 9 blue petals. Glue the flower to the cardboard base. Glue rhinestones, beads or stones in the middle. You can use tweezers for this.



Step six. To make the flower look even more interesting, glue on more petals, forming a flower similar to the one in the photo below.



Step seven. After the glue has dried thoroughly, you can cut the thread with which you collected the petals. Or don’t do this if the threads are covered by the middle of the flower. That's it, the kanzashi flower is ready and now this decoration can be worn in your hair.




Such an accessory can be a good gift for a friend or sister, for example. Kanzashi can be worn both on a holiday and on a weekday. Such flowers can be glued not only to a crocodile clip, but also to a hoop, hair tie, bobby pins, hairpins, etc. From small flowers you can create earrings, rings, and necklaces. It will look beautiful as a brooch.