Frequently Asked Questions About Horse Hair Jewelry Keepsake orders:

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• Q: How long will it take you to complete my order?

  • A: How quickly I can complete an order depends on several factors. 1) how many items you ordered, 2) what you ordered (resin orders take longer), 3) how many orders I have to complete before yours. Orders will take longer to complete around the holidays. I usually get slammed a few weeks before Christmas. That is why I recommend you plan well in advance if you want your orders before Christmas. ​

  • As a general rule, I tell people to be prepared to wait about a month before they get their orders back. Keep in mind, this is not all I do. I have a part-time job as an equine technician, I'm an artist (check out my custom portrait page), I do volunteer work at the Minnesota Zoo, I occasionally pet sit, and of course I need time to spend with my family.

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• Q: Why don't you offer more colorful beads and charms to go with the horse hair orders?

  • A: Basically, it's incredibly hard to find colorful beads with holes large enough to go around the braids or hair of bracelets, necklaces, keychains, etc. Usually any beads that have color that are of higher quality are made of glass. Glass, of course, is extremely prone to breaking. If I use a glass bead to glue and secure a braid on a keychain, for example, that is all that's holding that braid secure. If that bead breaks, the entire keychain will be ruined.​

  • Also, glass beads usually have very tiny holes because most people are using them to string onto thread or plastic thread. It's incredibly hard to find glass beads with large holes (I need beads with large holes to fit around bulky braids) because large hole beads are incredibly unstable. The same goes for plastic beads- they may be more stable than glass but they are going to scratch easily and become very unattractive very quickly.

  • The beads I do use with the horse hair jewelry are either sterling silver, stainless steel or quality pewter. These beads may be a little plain looking but they are very strong and won't break. Because they are strong, they can be made less bulky than glass or plastic beads and have larger holes.

 

• Q: Where do you get your horse hair?

  • A: For custom orders, I of course use the hair provided from the clients horse.​

  • Otherwise, the hair I use to make bracelets, necklaces, keychains, etc. to sell, sometimes people will donate their horse's hair to me or I buy the hair online. I've bought hair on Etsy and Nantahala's Trading Post. It's really nice buying hair that's already been processed for you because the hair is pristinely clean and all the hair are the same length. Where do those places get the hair? I have no idea. They don't disclose that information.

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• Q: Can you use my horse's mane hair to make my bracelet or necklace?

  • A: It depends on the length of the hair and the size of your wrist for a bracelet. There is no way for me to stretch hair to make it longer (some people really have thought I can do this). In fact, hair will often get much shorter as I work with it. Here's why: when I first get horse hair, the first thing I do is wash, condition and detangle. Unless your horse's hair was carefully cared for and protected from the wind, bitter cold and sun, the hair will have a lot of damage, particularly at the ends. I have to cut and remove the damaged hair because it will not withstand the wear and tear of being worn or billowed about as a keychain. Another step is I have to remove all the shorter hairs withing the bunch of hair so when I braid the hair, there aren't any little hairs sticking out of the braid that may poke out and irritate you. Finally, I braid the hair. Depending on the thickness or fineness of the hair and the type of braid I'm doing, this further shortens the hair up sometimes up to an inch or more. Sometimes the braided hair may only shorten a centimeter or so​. This is something no one has any control over. So by the end- you're not going to have much of a bracelet to where, let alone a necklace.

  • Another reason I don't like to use mane hair is because mane hair on most horses becomes very thin at the ends. This is very normal. It's the natural way hair is. When hair first starts sprouting of a hair follicle, the hair is pointed like the tip of a spear. As the hair grows, the shaft becomes thicker and thicker. When I braid hair that is thick on one end but gets thinner and thinner towards the ends, you end up with a lop-sided braid. Unless you're okay with this look, this is why I don't like using mane hair.

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• Q: I don't want to wash the hair. Do you wash the hair?

  • Yes, a majority of my clients don't know how to wash the horse hair once it's been removed from the horse or they just don't feel comfortable washing the hair. I do charge $10-$15 or more to wash the hair depending on how dirty or knotted the hair is. One time a client's horse had chronic diarrhea for several months in the middle of winter before he finally had to be euthanized. What this client send to me was essentially one giant, caked tail dreadlock covered in dried diarrhea. It took 3 hours of soaking, washing, conditioning, gently ​combing, repeat this tail to get it clean. That client got charged a lot more than my regular fee for that mess.

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• Q: Is the horse hair jewelry comfortable and durable?

  • First, this depends on how sensitive you are to things touching your skin. In my own experience, wearing horse hair on my body as a necklace or bracelet just takes some getting used to, like wearing rings. You eventually you'll forget it's there.​

  • I compare a horse hair necklace or bracelet to the feeling of a stiff rope. It's smooth but feels kind of different.  Before I braid the hair, I strip all the short hairs away so I'm left with hairs that are all the same length. This ensures you will not get any little hairs poking you as you wear it. If for some reason you do get a hair or two poking you, all you need to do is take a finger nail clipper and clip the hair down so the end is hidden down in the rest of the braid.

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• Q: All I have is a small amount of hair that isn't long enough to be turned into a necklace, bracelet or keychain. My horse is already gone so I can't get more hair. What can you do with it?

  • In these cases, this is where I put there hair in resin to preserve the hair forever. It takes just a few inches of hair to create a memorable resin piece. Check out the Resin Pendants & Keepsake page on this website. This is also a perfect option if you have any type of hair you want to preserve: donkey, dog, cat, feathers, snake shed, pig, llama, alpaca, wallaby, literally ​any type of hair.

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