How to Set Eyelets in Faux Leather with Melissa Cable

Create Recklessly, Symphony Faux Leather 10 x 2 Inch Strip, Fudge Brown (1 Piece) SKU: XCR-1328 $7.99

Note: This audio transcript is auto-generated and may not be completely accurate.
hi i'm melissa cable with create recklessly and i'm here to teach you how to set hardware in leather the first hardware that we're going to look at today our eyelets in the crate wrecklessly line we have three different size eyelids as you can see here a quarter inch 3/16 inch and 3/32 inch now those sizes denote the size of the actual eyelet itself the tube in the back that is going to extend into your leather the 332nd eyelet in the line actually has two different sizes this is the smaller one we also have a longer one so if you're stacking pieces of leather on top of each other and you want to attach them into the leather you have more material to go through the different layers now that brings us to a good point is how do you use eyelets what are they for so eyelids don't always need to be about attaching things so for example in this design here the eyelets are used to attach and as a decorative accent across the bracelet in this design right here they're really only there to serve as a great negative space on these individual white panels and then finally in this design back here you can see we've used eyelets on the end to attach a metal piece to the leather so again eyelets can be very functional to attach things to the leather or it can be an aesthetic choice that you're using to add a little pop of metal to your pieces so let's take a look at how to set them the only difference with setting eyelets into faux leather from setting it into leather is that you want to start with a different hole size so for example here's our 1/4 inch eyelet when we combined it with a washer it's actually called a grommet but for the sake of this video I'm going to go ahead and keep calling in an eyelet so that we have some consistent terminology normally in leather we would take our corresponding 1/4 inch hole punch and punch a hole to accommodate this eyelet but when we're using faux leather because it just a tiny bit of stretch again not as much stretch as a lot of other faux leather which is why I like this particular one we want to go down a size so instead of our quarter inch hole I'm going to take it down to the 3/16 inch hole and that's going to allow me to be able to stretch the leather to accommodate this eyelid so let's go ahead and see I'm gonna put this in here and you'll see we get a good tight fit now I went ahead and set these without smaller holes and without another trick I'm gonna show you in a moment just so you could see with the traditional 1/4 inch hole you can see I can stretch that leather and the eyelet is going to be popping right out of there so you really want to avoid that so you have a good strong design this is one of the reasons we use a a smaller hole now another trick to help eyelets stay really strong in your faux leather is to back your leather and here you can see I've glued on a piece of ultra suede and we've done another video that talks about the types of glues and things to use so be sure to check that video out and understand how to apply a backing ultra suede is less stretchy than the faux leather so when I stretch it it's it's going to minimize the stretch and that's gonna allow your eyelids to stay stronger so for example on the back of this one you can see I've backed it with faux leather and these eyelets are going nowhere they're really nice and strong in there and then finally another way the eyelet stays in especially with this quarter one is by turning it into a grommet and again a grommet is simply an eyelet that has a washer over it and our quarter-inch eyelets which have the most tendency to want to pull out in stretching materials come with the grommet so you'll just position it over the top of the eyelet let's move these out of the way and go ahead and set it so in order to set this eyelet the first thing we're going to do is take our large eyelet setter out of kit and screw it onto our handle after you have your tool prepared they're going to go ahead and get your mini anvil and notice again there's a concave side and a flat side and we're gonna use the flat side since the head of our eyelid or our grommet is flat and place it on the anvil and prepare to set it now you will notice that I did move our anvil onto the table and not on to the surface our work surface and that's on purpose the work surface will cause more bounce and you will not be able to set your hardware as effectively if you work on your work surface so when using your anvil be sure to place it on a good steady surface but keep in mind if you're working on your dining room table you can damage your table by hammering on to this so put it on something that's going to protect your work surface I'm going to place our eyelet setter on top of the eyelet and then give it a few hits with your hammer now one thing to keep in mind is that you don't want to set these too fast one big hit is going to potentially split your eyelet so you want to do a couple firm strikes in order to set it slowly and get the end of the eyelet to roll over the top of the washer replaced on it and now you'll notice that we have an eyelet that is nicely rolled on the end so it's smooth against your skin but it is holding down this washer here that's going to keep your eyelet from popping through when the finish on the front still looks beautiful and perfect so we're going to set all of our eyelets in the same manner let's go ahead and do that so you get a chance to watch it a few times so here's our it's 3/16 inch eyelet I particularly like this eyelet when I'm attaching things together as I did our necklace up here because the jump rings fit in there really easily so now I'm going to take this eyelet and once again turn it upside down onto our and now the quarter-inch eyelet tends to pull through the leather a little less because it's smaller so we don't necessarily need to have the washer on it however notice I'm working on a surface that's back again with the ultra suede in order to keep it from stretching this brings me to the point of when to do backing in this particular case because we're working with faux leather that has a tiny bit of stretch I like to use the backing but sometimes if I'm using other materials such as a firm leather that's not going to have as much stretch I may not use the backing on it and I'll just apply it directly so the backing is a good trick when it comes to the stretch of your material go ahead and switch out to our medium eyelet setter again all of the tools in the creep wrecklessly kit are labeled so it's really clear what we need and we're gonna give it the hammer a couple strikes and once again we have an eyelet that's it really well and you can see it's going nowhere through that faux leather and ultra suede and let's finish with our smallest eyelet this is our 332nd eyelet stretching it into that hole one thing I do want to mention about the hole for the 332nd eyelet is you'll notice we talked about how I went down in size for the hole for each of these eyelets now the smallest hole size in the create recklessly kit is three thirty-seconds so we wouldn't be able to go down smaller so in this particular case I really like to use the sewing punch on the largest hole on the platform to create this hole here I find in the faux leather it makes the perfect sized hole to be able to stretch in a 3/32 eyelet let's do that and then we'll go ahead and set that one so again we're gonna take off her head and you see they screw off very easily and switch to our small eyelet head place it over the top and again I'm using the 332nd eyelet that's the shorter version because I'm connecting things together in this case I'm simply putting it in as a decorative accent so I don't want to have excess material up here to try and set so I pick the shortest one available a couple good strikes and here we go once again another eyelet that's nice and set I'm going to show you another way to set eyelets in a way that's very strong with the 1/4 inch eyelets we can use the washer to increase the strength but with the three sixteenths and three thirty-seconds we have another trick up our sleeve and that's using the splay er displayer is another head in the interchangeable tool kit and you'll see it looks kind of like a flower shape on the top what displayer will do is take the eyelet and split it into many arms that are going to reach out and grab on to that leather so we're going to set it using our anvil on the flat side since the surface of our eyelets are flat and carefully position it now it's really important to get them centered and to work straight down when you're using this tool so you get a nice even split and as you'll see it split the arms and really even little pieces that again grip around on to that faux leather but you also notice it's a really pretty decorative look so feel free to set your eyelets from the surface of your leather and have a whole little collage of flowers across the top of your leather now you'll notice this player is stuck a little bit on here this is the only head that I ever have the need to use the allen wrench in and that's because each of these little arms are grabbing on to that and wanting to tighten our tool as we're working and so you simply place the allen wrench into the hole and give it a little grab and it'll easily come off it's a really good use of the splay to make a strong connection and to make a beautiful connection again eyelets are really one of the most versatile Hardware pieces that you can use in leather and faux leather whether you're using it as decorative accent or using it to connect things together it's a really firm connection that will give you lots of opportunities to play with different materials and combine them in any way that you'd like so thanks for watching I hope you have a chance to set some eyelets soon and be sure to check out our other hardware videos on cap rivets and spots thanks for watching you