DNA Maille Bracelet 3.0

Earlier this year, I started looking at maille projects and thinking about how I could use them for my own nerdy purposes. I love beading and all, and I always will, but I think it's important to branch out and try new techniques and styles. It's the mark of a dedicated artist and it's also just good for business. After all, not everyone is into beads!

I decided on maille because I had a huge surplus of jump rings (not so much anymore...) and because it's a totally different look from beads. Plus, one of my partners in craft is huge into maille so I had a personal resource I could tap any time I had questions or problems.

One of the first weaves I came across was the 4-in-1 spiral, which I loved because it looks exactly like a piece of DNA. But the spiral shape of that weave is difficult (impossible?) to maintain unless you lock it somehow—that is, unless you make it one loop—so I looked into other spiral weaves, and came up with DNA bracelet 1.0 and DNA bracelet 2.0 using "This Is Not Food."

DNA bracelet 1.0 (left) and 2.0 (right)

I was happy with them, especially 2.0, but the 4-in-1 spiral still had a hold on me. I was busy with other things, though, so I had to put solving that particular problem aside.

Now I'm not as busy, though. A couple nights ago I decided to sit down and see if I couldn't try out a simple solution: make a large spiral loop that would lock the shape into place, then add a clasp at either end (effectively making a double-stranded bracelet).

DNA bracelet 3.0

I think it turned out fantastically! Though I still have a few jump rings to tighten up, of course.

Here it is in action. Even from a distance you can see that the spiral is maintaining its shape.

The whole thing took around two hours, from opening all of the rings (I used 170!) to adding the clasp. My goal is to trim that time down to an hour and a half. It should be achievable; I spent a long time figuring out the best way to close the loop. I did it incorrectly the first couple of times, meaning that half of the bracelet spiraled while the other half kept twisting into Jens Pind Linkage, which I think is kind of ugly.

What do you think? Which one do you like better: bracelet 1, bracelet 2, or bracelet 3?