The craft whore

Yep, that’s me, a craft whore. I love my knitting, but a glimpse of a shapely bauble or fine bead and my head is well and truly turned. How else can I explain the fact that just two days ago I was sitting in a basement learning how to make bead jewellery?

I hate to use a cliche, but there is no other way of describing The Bead Shop in Covent Garden other than as a treasure trove of beading materials. Two floors of the prettiest, shiniest glass, crystal, metal, wooden (I could go on) beads, as well as findings in base metals, sterling silver and gold-filled. It’s a stunning, and totally overwhelming, experience.

I’ve wanted to make and design my own beaded jewellery for a while now, but I had no idea where to start. So many beads, so many findings - I couldn’t even work out what to thread them on. And, unlike knitting, there seems to be very little in the way of beginners’ instruction books.

I had previously been to a class at Buffy’s Beads in Kingly Court. This was great fun and I took away with me two bracelets and two necklaces that I’d made myself. The problem was that I couldn’t work out how to apply what I’d learned there to anything else. Give me the same materials and I could happily make those same necklaces and bracelets, but anything else was beyond me, and those tempting arrays of shining beads were just as daunting.

This is where The Bead Shop class comes in. Instead of making a finished product, the idea is to practice techniques. We went through where and why to use thread or nylon-covered metal (called Tigertail) and the different sizes. Then we strung some beads, learning how to use different findings such as calottes and soldered rings. Crucially, the teacher Emma had brought along samples of her own jewellery to show us what we could make with the techniques she was teaching us.

The afternoon was taken up making single loops and wire wrapping; both techniques for attaching beads to each other or lengths of chain. Afterwards there was some time to buy some products, on which we got a 5% discount. Because Emma was there with her jewellery it was easy to buy the beads for something she had already made. I’ve got everything I need to make up a gorgeous 12-stranded bracelet. Then it’s just a case of making sure I keep practising everything I learned.

The classes aren’t cheap, but at £80 for a full day, including all tools and materials, they are good value, and certainly a lot of fun. They run on the third Sunday of the month. See Emma’s website for details. If you are interested in making your own jewellery I would definitely recommend booking in.


Jewellery samples. Sorry for the quality of the photo. It's taken inside, at night, with flash. This really is the best I could do.