Making Glass Beads by Cindy Jenkins (2004)

After taking a two day beginning course in Lampworking , i bought this book to help me further what i had learned. It was really helpful and very good on the beginners level. I think it would be good for any new bead maker, even shows how to set up your torches and safety information. Paul~ jglasswerks

I thought this was an excellent book. I am totally new to glass. It walked you thought maybe different projects.

1) Do you want to learn how to make glass beads or marbles?
2) Are you looking for some artistic inspiration?
3) Do you love to collect beads and want to know more about their creation?
Then this is THE book for you. For those who want to learn lampworking I would also ask, "Would like to know exactly how the process works from start to finish before you ever pick up a piece of glass?" If so, then this is really the book for you. Cindy Jenkins beautiful book has all the basic information you need to teach yourself to do hot glass work: tools, setting up your workspace, heating glass, and lots of different techniques.

I learned about this book from a website of a glass marble artist who said he had learned exactly how to work the glass before he ever tried lampworking just from reading the book. That's because the pictures and instructions make the process very easy to understand. And it includes all the necessary basic information you need to teach yourself. You will have made your first beads completely in your mind so thoroughly that you'll "know" exactly what to do when you first start to make a real bead with real glass in a real flame.

I'd highly recommend this book if it stopped with the basics. It doesn't. It continues to describe the advanced processes of millefiori, cased beads, dichroic glass, hollow beads, sculpted beads, marbles, buttons and core vessels.

This book is the best how-to book I've ever read on ANY subject. It is filled with beautiful photos presented in an organized, orderly fashion. The book will be appreciated by any bibliophile and is itself an inspiring work of art.

The last word: This book delivers a combination of clearly written, highly detailed instructions and a whole lot of inspiring ideas. Making Glass Beads is an absolute must for anyone interested in making, buying or collecting lampworked beads, marbles or any other small, handmade glass objet d'art.

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