Saturday, June 25, 2011

What Do I Need To Make French Beaded Flowers?

There are a few basic items an artist needs to produce beautiful French beaded flowers. Here's a short list to help you on your way:

1. The tools. The most essential are a ruler, a wire cutter, and pliers. If you're not going to be working at a table you should also have some kind of lap board.

2. A few colors of seed beads. Have one or two colors for the flower, and some green for the leaves and other green flower parts. Czech beads are fine and inexpensive, but you can also use Miyuki or Toho beads. If you're really adventurous you can work with beautiful Swarovski beads too.

3. Spool wires and stemwires of the right gauges. Spool wire can be 24 or 26 gauge, stem wire can be 16 gauge. For larger flowers, also get lacing wire, 32 gauge.

4. Floral tape to cover all the stem wires.

5. Non-hardening floral clay to plant your flowers in.

6. Moss to cover the clay and make the arrangement look like it's growing out of soil.

7. Don't forget the beadspinner! This one tool can save you hours of painstaking stringing work and a lot of sore muscles.

You can get all these items and more at my new Amazon store at BeaderSupplies.com.

Thanks! Happy beading!

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