Different Types Of Wood Beads Available
In fact, they are one of the best choices in beads when it comes to hand crafting jewelry.
They are extremely light weight and easy to find.
They are also low cost.
Many different types of wood can be used to carve beads today.
During the earlier times, beadmaking was an exercise for apprentices, but it was also undertaken by masters and journeymen as spare time work.
Wood can be used to create many different sizes, types and forms of beads.
But, since they are easy to find and wood beads are extremely cheap beads, they seem to be taken for granted.
Today, you will hardly find much written material on this subject and bead researchers also don't seem to take much interest regarding the study of the different types of wood beads available.
Most of the information that can be found on wood beads is related to the prayer beads that Hindus use or the abacus which makes use of wood beads.
In this article, we will look at some of the different types of wood beads available today.
Many tree species provide material that can be used in the creation of beads.
These include sandalwood, olive, bayong, bamboo, ironwood, apple, palm, ebony, rose, pear and so on.
Wood from all these trees have been used to create beads due to many reasons.
Some provide wood that is aromatic while others have a beautiful grain.
If we look at olive trees, they have grain that is natural red in color and wavy.
When the tree ages, the heart wood hardens and the color darkens producing an elegant pattern.
Sandalwood beads These are light weight and have a light color as well.
They have a distinctive aroma and are mostly used by Hindus as they believe that it will bring clear perception to the person who wears it.
Rosewood beads Rosewood is dense and heavy and ideal for making beads.
It has grains that have fine lines of dark brown and black.
Bayong This tree mainly grows in the Philippines and is great for making into beads as it is durable which makes it long wearing and ideal for making jewelry.
It has a distinctive wood grain pattern and is warm red-brown in color.
Ebony Woods that come from the Ebony tree are dark and dense.
They have a very tight wood grain and some even have shades of two colors such as black and dark brown which give them a banded pattern.
Graywood beads When these beads are rolled around the light, they appear to have a smoky gray sheen.
Graywood beads are very smooth and lightwood and have a tight wood grain.