Clasps Used in Making Rock & Gemstone Jewelry

Video Transcript

"Hi there! On behalf of expertvillage.com my name is Candace Copeland. Welcome to the world of beads. I'm going to be telling you a little about how it is that I got started in this amazing collection. I've been collecting beads for years. All of a sudden one day I happen to be in Sedona, Arizona and walking down the street a woman stopped me and said where did you get that necklace. The reason I'm holding this is it was something similar to something like this with lots of really wonderful old ancient stones. Looks like it came right out of the museum. I said, "Well, I make beads. I've been collecting forever and it's mine." She said, "Where can I buy one?" I said, "Well, it's not for sale." She said, "Well, what would it take to make it for sale?" I kind of flipped her off. This was about 8 years ago and said, "Oh, how about 400 dollars?" and she wrote me a check. The rest is history and here I am doing these wonderful things, still collecting wonderful beads, still finding new ways, new approaches. Always something new. There's never a day that I don't see something else. As you can see from some of the variety of work that it goes from big chunk to beautiful delicate fluorites. It's limitless. Being into the bead business is really magical. This is another piece. Look at all the elements in this. This is shell. This is turquoise. Then all the different beads, which I've started to go into variety instead of everything matching symmetrically. There's one that's symmetrical. It's fun to get really creative and let yourself just go. Things don't have to be perfect. They don't have to be symmetrical .That's when the real artistic start to happen as they unfold into the magic. Sometimes I'll even mix. the earrings. I'll wear one earring of one and one of another. A woman came in the store one day and she said, "I like this one and I like this one. Would you sell one of each?" I said, "Great concept." I took the other pair and I get amazing complements just because they're so unusual. "