Loving Lampwork Beads

Posts Tagged ‘fine silver’

Lampwork Beads With Silver

It's not all that difficult to make lampwork beads with silver, but the trick is knowing how much you can heat the glass once you have put on the silver. Not enough heat and the bead cracks, too much heat and the silver melts into oblivion.

I've had some silver mesh for a few years now, and mostly have used it on the outside, like this set on the right. Fairly easy; make sure you have your bead all shaped and fire-polished, then let it cool slightly.

Once it's cool (but not cold), spot heat to red the place where you want the silver mesh to be. Gently place the mesh on the bead and burnish in. Then oh-so-gently heat up the spot again, to make sure the silver has bonded to the glass.

But be careful! Too much heat and the silver mesh will melt into blobs. Which can be pretty in its own right, but maybe not what you were hoping for.

However, I've had a love-hate relationship between encased mesh; I had been getting the silver blob look, and couldn't get the mesh to stay mesh-like.

Finally I decided that the mesh was not going to get the best of me, and that I would be able to encase it properly.

Here's one of my beads from this weekend, where the silver mesh is encased. Success!

(Whoops, sorry about the bright light reflections on this bead.)

When it comes to encasing silver, you really have to go slower and gentler with the heat. It takes longer to make these kinds of beads, because instead of the mesh being the final step, it comes sooner -- before you shape the bead.

So the trick was once I placed the silver mesh on the bead, I immediately encased it with clear. Then once all the clear was on, I moved the bead waaaaay back in the flame.

Heated slowly, the mesh keeps its look.

One more thing to mention. When working with silver leaf, foil, wire or mesh on a lampwork bead, it must be 99.9% fine silver. Sterling will just turn a really ugly gray.

So that's it in a nutshell -- working with silver on a lampwork bead. I'll probably do a set of these beads (like the one above), 'cause I think it's awful darn pretty! When the set is ready, I'll let ya'll know.

Meanwhile, here are some pretties from ebay for your viewing pleasure.