Crafty Avengers: how to make your own Hawkeye cuff

Hawkeye is the arrow-aiming, sharp-shooting star of Avengers Assemble, yet there isn't much Hawkeye craft out there since Jeremy Renner's ace archer hasn't had a Marvel movie of his own (yet). Lucky for us craft geeks there's a crafter out there for everything, and when I asked Pornokitsch's empress of geek chic, the cramdankulous Anne Perry, for a little Hawkeye help, for the Crafty Avengers series, she conjured up some of her own.

Over to Anne:

Did you spend the entire Avengers run-time staring at Hawkeye's amazing arms? I certainly did - and in my case, I was ogling both his biceps and that wristguard he was wearing.

So here, in Hawkeye's honor, is a Hawkeye-inspired DIY cuff-bracelet.

It looks like an ordinary cuff bracelet, but (like your average Avenger) it has a secret identity as a Hawkeye armguard-inspired accessory, which will impress anyone in the know.

It's also cheap to assemble and looks totally awesome. It seems complicated to make, but I promise it's not - though it can be time-consuming.

Put on a nice long movie and get crafting!

Materials

• 4 jump rings
• 1 pack of 15mm black elastic ribbon
• 4 meters of cotton cord, black and fairly thick, or a nice black ribbon (You won't use it all, but it's good to have extra)
• 1 pack of 7mm black snap fasteners
• 1 needle
• Black thread
• Scissors
• Chalk
• Measuring or tailor's tape
• Pins
• Masking tape or some other kind of gentle-adhesive tape

Overall cost: less than £5

Directions

1. Measure your arm

The Hawkeye cuff has four separate bracelet parts that will sit approximately 2cm apart from each other on your arm. So start by measuring the circumference of your arm at your wrist, then three more times further up your arm. You can use the width of your index finger as a rough guide to approximate the distance between the bracelets. My measurements were, roughly, 16, 17, 18 and 19 cm - rough is fine!

2. Measure and cut your materials

Cut two pieces of black cord for each bracelet, using your measurements plus another six or eight centimetres. Then measure out two pieces of elastic. You'll want the finished pieces to measure 6cm, so cut 8cm.

3. Begin assembly!

Make a cow-hitch knot around the jump ring!  To do this old your first measured piece of cord in half and slip the loop over the jump ring, then fold it under the ring. Then pull the loose ends through, so you have a knot on the ring, with the loose ends of the cord still flying free.

Make sure that each ring has both knots facing the same direction - on one side, the knot should just look like two pieces of cord wrapped around the ring. This is the down side! You want the other side, the knotty part (see picture), to be facing upwards on the finished cuff.
Next, thread your needle, fold the ends of the elastic down by 1cm each, and sew them into place, so that you wind up with two 6cm long pieces. You can cut off the excess after you've sewn the ends down.

Put one of the knotted jump rings aside, so that you're only working with three for the time being.

4. The complicated part

Tape the three knotted jump rings to the centre of the underside of your wrist (with the knotty upside facing out), at the points where you want the bracelets to sit.

Fold the first (lowest) set of cords on the right side up to the top of your wrist. Mark the point on the cords that denotes about 5mm to the right of the centre-top of your wrist with your chalk.

Do the same with the other set of cords from the same side of your wrist, leaving their left-side mates alone.

If you have trouble keeping the cords stable while you're marking, you can tape the ends to your wrist. Don't fold the cords around your wrist too tightly; it's better to be generous with the measurements than not.

Do this for each individual bracelet part. You can experiment to make sure everything is working properly, as in the photo above photo.

5. Sewing on the snaps

Take one of your jump ring bracelet parts and sew the first of the marked cord-pairs to the underside of one end of your first piece of elastic, being sure to centre the chalk mark in the middle of the elastic.

To ensure that you wind up with the correct side of the jump ring showing on the finished cuff, it's really important to make sure that you're sewing so that it's the underside of the cords that are face-up on the elastic, as in the photo.

Once you've sewn the cords on to the elastic, sew the female half of your snap to the centre of the cord. Be generous with your thread and make your knots strong! The photo shows the underside of the completed cuff, but should help make this clear.

Repeat this at 2 cm intervals down your elastic, so that you wind up with three cord-sets sewn to the elastic. Don't get rid of the extra cord yet. I taped mine together at this point to keep it out of the way.

6. Sewing on the snaps, part 2

Tape the three jump rings to the underside of your wrist again, and fold the elastic strip up to the top of your wrist. Everything in order? Good.

Now fold the second (left-side) set of cords up and mark where they hit the female half of the snaps you've sewn on. Don't do this too tightly or you'll wind up with a cuff that's too tight on your wrist.

Unfold and sew the male half of the snaps onto the cords, making sure that this half of snap is facing up. I used pins instead of chalk, which is why there are pins in the photo - definitely use chalk instead!

Now try your cuff on, with the elastic on the underside of your wrist. You should have three jump rings essentially lined up on top of your wrist. The elastic strip on the underside of your wrist should be a little off centre.

If anything is too tight or too loose, or the cords are twisted, you can cut off the male half of your snap and sew it back on again very easily.

7. The Hawkeye Element

You could stop here and have a very nice bracelet cuff, or you can go that extra mile and make it the Hawkeye cuff!

Hawkeye's armguard features two guard strips and four ties, because Hawkeye has so many muscles he requires two guards to keep them out of the way of his bowstring. True fact! So you're going to have to put a fourth bracelet and another strip of elastic on your cuff.
 Don't worry; it's easier than it sounds!

7.5. Let's do this thing

Still have your nearly-finished cuff on? Great! Turn it on your wrist so that the jump rings are back on the underside of your wrist, and tape the fourth jump ring so that it's the furthest up your arm, and lined up with the other three.

Now lay that second strip of elastic a little to the left of the strip you've already sewn down, so that one end covers the fourth (unfinished) bracelet and rests across the nearer two of the three you've already finished. There's no simple rule for this, just trial and error.

Fold the cords up and mark, as in Step 4. Then sew the cords and a female snap to the second piece of elastic at the marked bit. The two strips of elastic should be about a centimeter apart on the finished product.

Now repeat Step 5, so that you have another whole bracelet, with a strip of elastic and some extra snaps attached to it.

Use tape if things get a little wobbly as you're trying to fold and measure.

8. The other complicated part

Put the cuff on again, and then the fourth bracelet part. Place the second piece of elastic across the cords of the first cuff again. Carefully mark where the female snap parts hit the cords other two bracelets. It should look like the photo from Step 5.

Take everything off and sew the male snap parts onto the cords, again making sure that you're sewing the snap facing upwards. If you mess up it's easy to cut the snaps off and sew them back on the right way.

9. You're so close!

You hold in your hands a very nearly completed Hawkeye cuff!

You should have four bracelet parts attached to two strips of elastic. The two strips should be about a centimetre apart. The first and last bracelet should only be attached to one piece of elastic each, while the middle two should be sewn to both.

Don't cut off that extra cord yet! Try the cuff on! How's it fit? If you think it's perfect (and I'm sure it is), take it off again, cut the excess cord away, and put it back on.

Wear it everywhere with pride!

Congratulations! You look amazing. Get out there are make arrows fly.


There are lots of things you can do to gussy this up, like use strips of soft leather instead of elastic. Or use pretty gold rings instead of jump rings, or ribbon instead of cord. Hawkeye's traditional costume was purple and blue - you could make your cuff colourful instead of black! No matter how you chose to go about it, you can't lose.

If you've seen Avengers Assemble you can check out Anne's Avengers movie review
over at the geektastic Pornokitsch.