7 Things You Need to Make Glass Beads - Glass

At a bead fair I was discussing with a potential bead maker about what kit they should buy when they started. So what kit do you need?

1. Glass
2. Something to heat the glass with
3. Mandrels to wrap the glass round
4. Bead release to stop the glass sticking to the mandrel
5. A way to cool the beads down so they don't thermal shock
6. A way to clean the bead release out of bead
7. … and a kiln if you want to sell your beads

Yup it really is that simple. But I have to say it’s scary that this is the minimum you need to make a glass bead, given the amount of tools I have hidden away in my shed.

Glass

There are a number of types of glass on the market but in the UK the cheapest and most easily available glass is soft glass with a CoE of 104.

OK so what does that mean? A CoE or coefficient is about the rate of expansion of the glass. Basically different glasses cool at different rates. A bead with a two different types of glass in will crack with what's known as a compatibility crack, when one glass cools quicker… not good if you’ve spent ages making a bead.

Satake Glass

This is amazingly soft glass has a CoE of 113 or 120. It is favoured by Japanese bead makers, and wow can they make some lovely beads. They often have a very distinct style due to the lower melting temperature and wonderful colour pallet. In the UK it’s quite hard to get hold of this glass, the main supplier being Satake Glass USA. To use this glass effectively you need a special burner.

104 Glass

When people talk about glass beads they often talk about Murano glass.

You can get Murano glass rod or another brand Venice glass Effetre (3 brothers who split from Murano glass) to make glass beads. Effetre. In the UK Effetre is often what people start with.

There are a number of brands of glass which are have a CoE of 104

• Ask
• Effetre
• CiM Messy Colour
• Double Helix
• Lauscha
• Northstar
• Reichenbach
• Vetrofond

Theoretically they can be used together in the same bead. I say theoretically because every now and again glasses that you think should work together give you cracks that look like incompatibility cracks.

The supplier I use in the UK is Tuffnell Glass, or Off Mandrel who I think give a great service.

Bullseye Glass

Bullseye has a CoE of 90. It is slightly stiffer than 104 and cools when you are working it more quickly. This means it is great for fine stringer work. Bullseye also has the most amazing pinks and purples. The best place in the UK to get it is Warm Glass, Off Mandrel or Creative Glass.

Borosilicate Glass

Pyrex is a brand of borosilicate or boro glass. Boro glass has a CoE of 30 to 33 and is classed as a hard glass… and wow is it hard in comparison to soft glass. You need a hot torch to work it but it does have some fantastic advantages. The colours you can get from Boro are amazing due to the amount of gold and silver in the glass. It is also great for sculpture and making glasses. Available Tuffnell Glass, Off Mandrel and Creative Glass

There are other glasses on the market and I guess that this is only an introduction to the glasses out there.

So what do I use?

I tend to use Effetre glass coloured glass and Lauscha clear glass for encasing my beads. I tend not to use the silver glasses or reactive glasses, but that’s because I tend to make beads with a sculptural quality. It’s also because I’m a bit of a miser and some of the glass can get really expensive… especially if you are importing them from the states.

End Note

The only way to know for sure if a glass is compatible with another is to do a compatibility check. I will write another article explaining how to do this.

6 Steps to Great Lampwork Beads Using Bead Presses

Why Use a Bead Press?

There are many reasons to use bead presses.

• You can ensure consistency in size
• You can relatively easily create a good shape
• Your buyers have a fairly good idea what the bead will be like and can design more easily
• Buyers may prefer different shapes presses can provide
• You can create shapes you would find difficult by hand

Guidelines for Using Any Press

The thing about presses is that they look easy but creating a good bead with them is not guaranteed.

1. Over filling

This creates little ridges around the seams which if the bead is meant to have a flat edge will seriously affect the quality of the bead. With lentils you end up with a very fine edge which kinda makes it look like a fried egg. They can be disguised or melted in or take some of the glass off the bead. Having said that melting them in doesn’t always work and you can still see the poor design.

2. Under filling

This will mean that the glass doesn’t get all the way to the extremities of a shape meaning you have duff corners or a lentil that doesn’t quite work. It kind of defeats the whole purpose of using a press

3. Unbalanced bead

This tends to be my speciality. These are the beads where the mandrel didn’t quite stay in the middle of the bead. Some buyers may like this as they can guarantee that the bead will hang that way, however if they are part of set it really isn’t going to help your reputation.

The bottom line is that wonky beads are not good beads although they might be sellable to the right person

4. Dimples

There is a huge debate about how dimples should look on pressed beads. It is however incredibly easy to make sharp pointy holes on beads using a press which is not good.

If it is a bead with a flat edge, normal indent dimple rules should apply. With lentils it is good to have a decent dimple that a spacer bead can fit in. The reason for this is that the glass is going to be very thin around the hole and with wear over time this can cause the glass to break, or at least become very rough which could cause the threading material to break. As a bead seller, not a great way to get repeat business.

5. Chill marks

Pressed beads are always going to get those little ridges across the surface of the bead. They really do need to be smoothed out and smoothing them out has an added benefit that you are adding heat which will help with the whole thermal shock thing.

6. Pressed beads are more likely to thermal shock

As the bead is thinner on one axis it will cool quicker here and will more prone to breaking. The way to work round this is to put pop the beads into a warm kiln and to heat the area nearest the mandrel so that the bead can cool more evenly.

Pressed beads make up a large number of the beads that we make as a community. With the whole practice practice practice idea you can get to a place where you can make great pressed beads that you will be proud of in a few years time.

Links to Tutorials for Specific Presses

I have presses from a number of places. Some of these links are to sites which sell presses. I’m not specifically endorsing them, just highlighting their tutorials

• Cattwalk Tutorials They have tutorials including Bicones, Crunch, Emerald Cut, Lentil, Puffy Pillow, Triangle, Tabs (Round Emerald)

Pricing Your Lampwork Beads

I have to be honest this is one of my bug bears.

Pricing is not just about you

Before I started making lampwork beads I genuinely could not understand how people could get away with charging as much as they did for a piece of glass.  As I’ve learned to make beads and learned to love our community of bead makers I’ve realised that this perception of the value of our own work seems to underpin a lot of what we do.

Charging appropriately for what we make is about respecting ourselves and the community of lamp workers we are part of and consequently represent. 

I was reading a thread over at LE - Lampwork Etc. where artists who had been making a living from lampwork were beginning not to be able to pay their bills (pre economic downturn).  The sense was when we as hobbyists and students undercharged for their work, the people who buy lampwork were not prepared to pay the prices they needed to earn a living from glass.  If I undercharge I am teaching people that these bits of glass are just that, bits of glass, rather than amazing works of art formed through this incredible process.

Under pricing could affect you in the future

I guess this is a bit of a warning. 

We all know of people who sell their beads for a lot of money.  I saw a bead going for over $300 a few weeks ago.  The truth is it was an amazing bead from someone with a reputation, but still wow that's amazing.  So there is money to be made.

My thoughts go something like by underselling, I damage the price that people are prepared to pay.  That means as I improve my skill and my reputation, people are prepared to pay less than they were prepared to pay before.  I therefore end up earning less.  Not good.  In this scenario the only way to earn the big money is to have an amazing reputation and make amazing and distinctive beads, and to be honest there are only a handful of names in this category.

So the formula

50p a minute or $1 a minute

Seriously it is that easy.  Due to the exchange rate the $1 a minute is quite different from 50p a minute so there is a price range you could go. It is what I was recommended when I was taught and what I see being recommended by people who have been lampworking for a while.

I also have a wholesale price.  Simply because if I sell to a local shop they have a mark up they need to put on.  If I sell at retail price, then I am charging less so why would people purchase from the local shop.  I’m to great a competition.

30p a minute or $0.60 a minute

I’ve never sold wholesale to the US so I don't know how that would work but I know with the UK shops it worked out at a price that the shop owners were willing to pay as were their customers.

But my beads aren't worth that much

So what if you don't think your beads are not worth that much?Seriously there could be a number of issues going on

• The beads aren't good enough – have a look at the post 10 standards for selling good lampwork beads.  If they pass they are good enough to sell.  If not think about developing your skill a bit more, sell to family and friends, use them for yourself, fuse them, there are all sorts of options.
• I’m new to lampwork - so you make your beads slower than some who has been doing it for years.  Why not estimate how long it would take them to make the beads and charge at that rate?
• I’m a hobbyist I don't need to charge as much – you don't but others need you to charge that much.  You are unintentionally affecting others who earn their living by glass art.  Consider your community when you consider your pricing.
• I just cant charge that much – when I initially stated this was one of my key thoughts.  For me it started to highlight something about not being good enough as a person and not being worthy enough to earn money through something I loved.  Truth I am good enough and I don't need to be a struggling artist.

I’m sure there are other reasons why we don't charge correctly.  Please hear my words as guidelines and recommendations and hopefully not a lecture. 

Go for it make fantastic beads and sell well.

10 Standards For Selling Good Lampwork Beads

In the excitement of starting to make lampwork beads is the amazement that other people like our beads and are wanting to buy them. So when are we ready to sell our beads.

1. Good holes.

The holes of your beads need to be neat, to not have any sharp points. Quite simply if your beads have sharp points they could cut the stringing material a bead worker is using damaging your buyers jewellery and potentially affecting their reputation.

You are also selling something with a sharp point, which after all is glass and so could cut the buyer.

People recommend that you should have good puckers, what that means is that there are nice dimples so the whole thing is smooth. There different recommendations for different shapes and different personal preferences, but I would recommend that the holes always go in a little.

I do know that some people “drill out” the holes to get rid of the sharp points. This will leave an etched look on the bead and a rough surface. There is no harm in doing this for beads you intend to keep but it is best to avoid on beads you intend to sell.

2. Shape of the bead

The bottom line is that most people who are buying our beads are buying them to make jewellery and generally they need the bead to hang right in the design.

It is fairly obvious when beads are off centred and don't hang right. One of the surprises for me was with my signature peacock beads. With the way that the glass is place to form the body, it causes the beads to be unbalanced and turn meaning that designers have needed to be careful how they have used them. I have subsequently changed the orientation of the design which makes a huge difference.

There is no problem in making an off centred design if that is how it is intended to be. You just need to let your buyer know, you don't want buyers returning your beads.

3. Structurally sound – No cracks or defects

In my mind it goes without saying that beads should be structurally sound. What has scared me when I have looked at beads the number of people who sell damaged beads. I even found some at a bead show on a lamp workers stall and they were telling me how wonderful their work was. Unfortunately my thoughts were you are unintentionally affecting me by selling stuff which is substandard

4. Stringer design well attached

It is so exciting when you begin to get design on beads. It is really important however that it is well attached. The bottom line is if the dots or stringer are under cut and not flush to the bead, the glass will come off at some point. Not great if you’ve already shipped the bead and someone is wearing the bead as it can lead to sharp glass … ouch.

5. Annealed.

It is strongly recommended that you anneal your beads in a kiln before you sell them. This is often the main difference between mass produced beads.

The basic science is that cooling the bead at a slow rate allows the bead molecules to line up rather than being random. Having random molecules means that the glass is more likely to break or crack at some point in the future.

Annealing your beads means that in the future it could be your beads that archaeologists dig up because they have survived years. It also more practically means you will have happy customers.

6. Cleaned.

One of the things about mass produced beads is that often they are not cleaned properly. From a designer point of view this leads to a yucky white substance coming from the beads. What I didn't realise for a long time is that this powder can be cancerous if breathed in. Frankly any fine dust breathed in is bad for your lungs.

Look after your customers by cleaning your beads and look after yourself by cleaning your beads underwater.

7. Chill marks.

These are little rings and ridges which appear on your beads when you use tools or press your beads. They appear because different bits of the glass cool at different rates. The bead need to be warmed to clean these marks off to create a nice smooth surface.

Having said all this I have seen a friend create lollipop beads where she deliberately left the marks as part of the design. Some people just have to be different hey.

8. Bubbles

Bubbles are the curse of clear or transparent glass especially when you are encasing the bead. The aim is to create a bead free of bubbles. Some people like bubbles in beads and my understanding is that they don't affect the structure of the bead but a good bead is bubble free.

9. Pricing.

This is a hugely touchy subject but the bottom line is if as a designer you sell a handmade bead for a cheep price you are teaching the guys who buy beads that lampwork beads are not worth much. This then affects the other lampwork bead makers.

You may only be making as a hobby, you may no feel you are good enough but the recommendation is that you charge 50p a minute whilst making the bead. That will cover the cost of the making the bead and promotion. If you feel a better lamp worker would make the bead faster then charge for the time you think it would take them.

10. Insurance.

The unfortunate reality of selling is that it makes sense to have Public Liability Insurance. Should the glass you sell harm someone, it makes sense to be able to protect you and your family financially.

Enjoy melting glass, it is the most amazing thing you can do. Hopefully this article should give you an idea of when it is a good time to start selling your precious orbs of glass.