No More Knotted Necklaces with These Jewelry Packing Tips

Posted on July 6th

Frustrated by finding your jewelry tangled up when you travel? These DIY solutions will save you time (and money) while keeping your jewelry safe, clean, and tangle-free.

When it comes to packing, people are always discussing clothing, toiletries, and electronics, but what about the tiny details? Earrings can lose backs, necklaces become tangled, and before you know it, your vacation jewelry is a mess. These easy tips for packing jewelry will make sure your accessories are ready to go as soon as you arrive.

Use Straws to Keep Necklaces from Getting Tangled

There’s nothing worse than lifting out a necklace to wear, only to find that it is completely knotted and tangled up. One of the easiest solutions involves using straws.

Yep, you read that right. Basic plastic or paper straws are the perfect hack for keeping your thin-chain necklaces free of knots while in transit. The idea is to use the straw on part of the chain to keep it straight and out of contact with the rest of the chain, reducing the likelihood of tangles.

Just follow these quick steps before packing up your necklaces:

1. If necessary, cut the end of a plastic or paper straw so that it approximately matches the length of one side of the necklace in question.
2. Unhook the clasp on the necklace.
3. Thread one end all the way through a straw.
4. Re-fasten the necklace.

Buy or Make a Jewelry Roll

The trick to keeping necklaces free of knots and tangles, no matter the approach, is to keep the chain from coming into contact with itself. To that end, a jewelry roll can be a smart choice too, with the added bonus of padding the items from in-transit jostling.

1. Lay out a washcloth or hand towel, completely flat and horizontally oriented.
2. Lay your necklaces parallel to the short side of the towel, keeping some space between each piece.
3. Take the left side (one of the short sides) of the towel, and begin rolling the towel into a wrap towards the right side. This should result in each necklace being wrapped in layers, but not “folded” vertically.
4. Depending on the space available in your travel bag, either fold the rolled-up towel in half, top to bottom, and secure the ends with rubber bands, or skip the folding and simply secure it with rubber bands for a longer, thinner roll.

Put Earrings on Cards

One of the trickiest parts of traveling with earrings is the constant worry that an earring back will get lost or misplaced. There are several different methods you can try to ensure your earrings get to your destination intact and ready to use.

A backing card can help keep your earrings organized, avoid tangling of longer earrings, and help the backings stay on them. If your earrings don’t already have a backing card (or if you’ve thrown it away to reduce storage space), you can make one yourself.

All you need for a DIY earring backing card is a sturdy piece large enough to accomodate all the earrings you want to take, while leaving a little space in between. Simply punch your earrings through the material and snap the backs on the back of the card.

You can choose any number of materials to make your own earring cards, including:

• An index card
• A piece of a Styrofoam plate
• A business card
• A piece of cardboard from a box or envelope

For added protection, slip the earring card inside of a plastic bag or cloth jewelry pouch, so that on the outside chance an earring back slips off, it will land right in the bag and not get lost.

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