Go to Beadaholique.com for all of your beading supplies needs!
Hi and welcome to Beadaholique.com's third video in our Learn to Bead Series where we explore the
basics of creating your very own beaded jewelry.
In this installment we'll be covering basic stringing materials.
To begin let's take a look at beading wire.
Now when you think of wire
you probably think of something
that's kind of stiff and bendable and able to keep its shape.
But beading wire is different.
It's comprised of tiny metal cables usually braided and given a protective coating so
that it's soft and pliable for the beads to hang naturally and nicely.
It comes in different weights and strength as well as different strand amounts.
The better and stronger the wire the greater the strand count.
So as a beginner it would be wise to work with less expensive types of wire
and as you grow in your beading experience or if you decide to sell your creations
you can
advanced to some more high quality larger strand count wire.
It comes in
this right here is twenty four carat
gold plated and sterling silver plated for your finer
designs
It comes in a very fine
all the way up to a very heavy gauge so you can
string
larger
beads.
It also comes in
many different colors
and that's incase you want your design to show the wire
like in this bracelet.
So if you have just small seed beads
or really light beads
you want to string them on a very fine
wire.
And then heavier beads like the heavy gem stones you gonna want to string them on heavier wire.
So that's beading wire. Now I'm going to talk a little bit about
artistic craft wire or precious metal wire and
that also comes in a variety of sizes and colors.
The sizes are
determined by what guage the wire is.
Now the larger
the number of the gauge the finer the wire.
So this is a pretty thin piece of wire right here and this is twenty-four gauge.
So a twenty-eight gauge wire would be even thinner than this.
This piece right here
is quite thick.
This is twelve-gauge.
Wire of this kind of the kind that can be bent and manipulated and
made into round shapes is usually used for wire wrapping and we have a very handy video
on our website about how to wire wrapped beads together.
Now let's talk about chain.
Chains are a very handy tool in jewelry making
because really you can just cut a length of it and hang your favorite pendant and
you're ready to go.
Sometimes you need to put a clasp on it
like this one.
Or sometimes you can buy chains that are pre-made and already has a clasp. So you just chain your
favorite pendant on there.
Now it comes in
once again all kinds of finishes in types of metals.
It comes in sterling silver and gold filled and pretty soon we're gonna carry silver filled.
Comes in an antique finishes and interesting shapes.
Comes in aluminum with different
prints on it.
You can buy charm chain like this with
little dangles off of it and
that's really cute.
Comes in very very large sizes and
fun colors. This is a ball chain that's like a pale purple color.
Now here we have the variety of materials that you can also use in your beading designs.
These materials are ribbons such as these
silk ribbons or grosgrain ribbon.
You can use really any kind of ribbon. We sell velvet.
This right here is a faux suede.
You can use hemp.
All of these come in a variety of colors
and really
so many uses.
Just like the chains a lot of these materials come finished necklaces or finished bracelets.
So you could buy pre-made necklace and hang your favorite pendant from it or
you can make your own design. Here I have silk ribbon and I added a beaded
length to it.
Or you can really go crazy and cut multiple strands and hang
charms from the multiple strands.
There's so many things you can do with these materials.
Now if you want to get into intricate work such as bead weaving. You're gonna want some
very fine thread.
And that thread comes in the form of
K.O. thread or NYMO and they're both nylon based thread. They come in
a variety of colors
so that you can match your beadwork.
You could also use
crystal clear or black
fireline or wildfire.
These are both synthetic materials that are really strong and they also used for bead weaving.
Finally I'm going to talk about stretch materials.
Stretch materials mostly just come in clear.
They're really good for beginners also because you can just cut a length,
string your favorite beads and tie a secure knot and
wear your design.
We have a very handy video on our website once again
for how to use and knot
stretch material.
So thanks for watching and join us next time when we discuss the various types of tools
needed for basic beading projects.
Go to Beadaholique.com for all of your beading supplies needs!