Beading basics and buying beads and findings.

Who among us doesn't stop to look at beautifully made jewellery? Often the biggest component of that jewellery is the beads- without them the jewellery just wouldn't have that special something. The next step for us creative types is to give it a go and see if we can make that piece of jewellery we have always dreamed of.

To start with the enormous amount of information can be overwhelming and not particularly helpful... so... where do you start on the road to becoming a Beadaholic?

My recommendation to the many people who ask me is for them to start at their local library. There should be many basic instruction books to get you started and it is a cheap way to get quick information. Next is deciding what kind of jewellery you like and would like to start with ... that is the easy part as we all are naturally attracted to pretty things to our individual tastes. My suggestion is to keep it simple for your first attempt.

There are resources abound out there to get your supplies from. We run an extensive beading website at direct to customer wholesale prices. All our products are competitively priced to make jewellery creation affordable and fun. click here to see our site

We offer a brilliant selection of bead mixes to get you started bead mix selection Buying beads in mixes is by far the best value way to build up a good range of colours, shapes, sizes and textures.

From there you will need the slightly less exciting but totally necessary basic "findings". Findings is a term used by beaders to describe things used for the construction of jewelery. Things like clasps, earring hooks, crimps and pins. Most findings are sold as plated base metal in either silver or gold finish. There are varying degrees of quality from different suppliers. You are better off to go with a reputable supplier with high quality findings. Low quality findings are often plated over nickel and will easily cause irritation when worn, the metal can also be weak leading to breakages and wasted time and products. Please click here for an idea on high quality findings

Next will be your stringing material... what you are going to thread your beads onto. As with everything in beading there is a huge array of products. The most versatile and popular in recent times is "tigertail". It is a very fine stainless steel wire coated with a thin layer of nylon to make it comfortable to wear and easy to use. It is so fine it looks like a fine thread. You can do nearly everything with this wire and all that is needed is a bit of imagination, some crimps, clasps and beads. stringing materials

Right- you are almost set! All you need now is a quiet area and some basic tools. Raiding the closest available "man shed" is fantastic but if your man isn't that keen to share then what you will need is some wire snips or side cutters for cutting the tigertail and some Chain Nose pliers, otherwise known as Needle nose pliers. These will be used for squishing crimps. To see photos of tools and their manes and uses please visit our beading tools page.

Simply put- beads and beading is a way of life for many of us. Any beader will tell you how addictive it is (you can never have too many beads) . It is so relaxing, almost like colour and textural therapy.

We have the most comprehensive beading website in New Zealand... take a look beadaholic NZ. Feel free to ask any questions you might want answered. I am absolutely addicted to beads and beading and love helping out others who are wanting to learn this rewarding craft.