Books on Jewelry Making and Beading

[~Katie~]

I'm looking for some books on beginning jewelry making and beading. Anybody have any recommendations? Thank you

[~Katie~]

Anyone???

[JTA Mom]

Well, what type of jewelry making are you interested in?

The best advice I can give is to go to a big bookstore and the library and just browse through the jewelry books there. That way you see what's in it and if it will fit your level of knowledge and interests or not.

Ami

[Aithne]

What type of jewlery making are you interested in? Beadwork, chains (making your own), fabrication?

Normally I would agree with the previous poster and suggest checking out the bookstore, except that every time I've ever been in there, all I've found is beadworking books and I primarily do fabrication and chains.

Beadwork is presently the most popular and also the least expensive to get started with and you can find tons of books on it at the bookstores and craft stores. If you're more interested in chains or fabrication, let me know and I'll check my book collection and see if I can locate some good titles for you.

[~Katie~]

I like beading, but I also like the idea of working with wire as well. Every time I go to look at books I get completely lost. Does that narrow it down a little?

[lilsparrow]

:

[Aithne]

ok. For beading, just look through the books on the shelf until you find one that's got some interesting projects in it and try them out. You can also check your local craft stores to see if they have any beginners classes or recommendations for beginning beading books.

For chain and wire work...let me see if I can locate the book I've got. Ok, nevermind. It's still packed somewhere. However I did locate this book and I think it might give you a good starting point for wire working. It's called Making Silver Chains: Simple Techniques, Beautiful Designs and I think I'd like to get myself a copy of it when I've got the $$.

By the way, once you do a little experimenting and figure out how to make a chain in the first place - it's a lot of fun. It's one of the things I got absolutely addicted to.

One other thing that hasn't been mentioned yet, is to search on Amazon (that's where I found the title I mentioned above). Search for things like wire jewelry, chain jewelry, etc... Check the reviews on the books too, in a lot of the customer reviews it mentions what level of experience it would be a good book for.

Good luck!


By the way - if you see mention of needing an Oxy/Acetelyne torch...you don't need it, a small hand-held propane torch works excellently for wire work. but don't let that deter you from a book with good projects in it. Just sub propane for oxy/acetelyne and keep going.