Lampwork Glass Beads

Lampwork glass beads are colorful beads with various patterns on them. These glass beads types have delicate multicolored decoration in the form of wisps of colored glass. They are made by melting clear and colored glass with a torch and wrapping it around a metal rod. Lamp work involves heating of glass canes to very high temperature due to which the glass melts and starts flowing. As a result it becomes easier to make patterns of animals, flowers on the beads. Lampwork glass beads are used for a variety of purposes like for making lampwork jewelry and other crafts. Some of these glass beads such as the Christmas lampwork beads are used for decoration purposes too.

Lampwork Glass Bead Making

For lampwork bead making, a torch is used to melt glass rods and tubes. Once in a molten state, the glass is formed by blowing and shaping with tools and hand movements. The process of lampwork bead making is also known as flameworking or torchworking. This is because, in modern bead making techniques, oil-fueled lamps have been replaced by gas fueled torches. The term "lampwork" was initially used many years ago when people used to blow air through oil lamps in order to melt the lampwork glass for making these handmade glass beads.

History of Lampwork Glass Bead Making

Lampwork Glass Bead Jewelry

Lampwork glass bead making is, in fact, a variant of wound glass bead making technique- a more labor intensive process for making beads- and is traditionally referred to as lampworking. In 19th century, Venetian glass beads were produced in large quantities for African trade. The core of a decorated glass bead was made from molten glass at furnace temperatures, mostly made by men as an industrial process. Afterwards, the delicate multicolored decoration was added by other people, mostly women, who used to work at home with the help of an oil lamp or spirit lamp. They used to re-heat the cores of the glass beads and decorate them with fine wisps of colored glass. These lampwork artisans were paid on a piecework basis for the lampwork glass beads they made. Today, lampwork beads are made using a gas torch which heats lampwork glass rods. The lampwork artisans spin the resulting thread around a metal rod covered in bead release. When the base bead is thus formed, other colors of glass are added to the surface to make various designs. This is the basic lampwork beadmaking process after which the glass beads may be further fired in a kiln to make them more durable.

Modern Lampworking Supplies

Although lampworking supplies differ from one process to other process of bead making, there are certain lampworking supplies which are common to all of them such as torches, glass rods and tubes, wires for spinning the molten glass to make patterns etc. Thus, modern lampworking supplies include single or dual fuel torches. The flameworking torches are more popular among beadmakers when compared to the Metalworking torch. The reason for this preference is that a flameworking torch is usually "surface mix"meaning in it, the oxygen and fuel is mixed after it comes out of the torch, resulting in a less noise making tool and lesser dirty flame. Unlike metalworking torch, the flameworking torch is fixed and the bead and glass move in the flame.

Each bead is worked over flame using the glass rods. A lampwork glass bead is thus made by heating the rod over the flame onto a copper wire. Different rods are used to create the patterns and colors. The size of the bead depends on the mould. Once the decoration is complete, the beads are placed into chips of mica to allow slow cooling so that they do not crack in the process. Thus the s can be called the essential lampworking supplies for making these decorative glass beads

Marvers or the Flat surfaces used to roll glass upon for giving them shape, smoothness or for decoration, usually made of graphite or steel.
Rods and other shapes to marver or shape the glass.
Brass, graphite, or wooden molds to mold the hot glass.
Tungsten picks which may be used to drag glass around on the surface, or to make a hole through a bead.
Steel jacks, generally coated with beeswax, to cut off a piece.

Types of Lampwork Glass Beads

There are basically two types of lampwork glass beads- artisan-made lampwork beads and mass-produced lampwork beads. It is very difficult to make out the differences between these two types of lampwork glass beads but they are different in respect of their making process as well as quality and durability.

Artisan Made Lampwork Beads

Artisan Made Lampwork Beads

These lampwork beads are handmade glass beads made individually by artisans which display their craftsmenship and high skills in beadmaking. Artisan made lampwork beads are more expensive thean other types of lampwork beads. However, they are also of higher quality and do not break easily as they are often kiln-annealed. Annealing involves slow cooling of beads in a temperature controlled kiln so that the glass molecules get an opportunity to slow down which in turn reduces stress in the glass. Therefore, kiln annealed artisan lampwork beads become more stable and less breakable.

Mass Produced Lampwork Beads

Mass produced lampwork beads are usually made in countries like India, China etc. As they are cheap and are supplied in bulk by wholesale lampwork glass bead manufacturers and exporters, they can be found abundantly all over the world. However, they are of lower quality when compared with kiln annealed artisan made lampwork beads. Mass-produced lampwork beads are cooled in fiber blankets, sand or vermiculite. Sometimes, they are not allowed to cool at all in a systematic way. This make the glass beads cools off very quickly without reducing the stress in the glass. Thus, these types of lampwork beads which are mass produced break off easily.

Sometimes Venetian made lampwork beads and even Czech glass beads are mistaken as artisan made beads. Although both these types of beads are of higher quality than mass-produced lampwork beads but they are not artisan made beads.

Uses of Lampwork Glass Beads

Lamp work glass bead are used for making jewelry and sometimes for decoration. Owing to the beautiful patterns and decorations on these glass beads, the lampwork jewelry has become a preferred one among all other beaded jewelry. The other decorative beads like lampwork focal beads and lampwork flower beads are not only used for jewelry making but also for decorative purposes. The smaller beads are used for lampwork crafts whereas the larger beads in decorative shapes are used individually for decoration. Special purpose beads like Christmas lampwork beads are also made by lampworking artisans for special occasion Christmas decorations!