May 14

We started off the day by driving to a pressed glass bead factory that specialized in large beads.

 walking past all of the rods of glass

Heating the rods of glass

 Pressing the glass beads

 the pressed beads coming out of the press- these are extremely hot!

 tumbling of the beads

We all dived in and bought kilo's of beads by the gazillions. We had to drag everyone out so we could go to the next stop.

                                          

Roxanne found a great find! She was in bead heaven (to say the least).

Next, we drove to Zelezny Brod to see a peacock factory and again we were able to buy stock. We watched the vacuum press machines in action, while the owner told us about the technology of how the beads were made and what metals he used to make the special peacock finish.

Again, everyone loaded up on these very special beads.

Instead of lunch ( can you imagine that? Hmmm- lunch or beads? What a choice to make.), we drove to a fire polish factory where we were able to see the faceting of glass beads.

And after watching the whole process, were able to buy from 3 different stock rooms. One had the rounded fire polish, one had the different shapes of cut fire polish and one had pressed beads.

 Mary found her a lovely fire polish to add to her stash.

Again, more loading up of great beads for all.

 Akiko and Guy are on the hunt.

After lunch we visited a lampwork factory where we saw a worker making lampwork beads. Of course we then purchased beads, flowers and vases from stock. Everyone left with huge smiles on their faces from all their lovely finds. We even found a lovely little hand blown snail lamp for our son's girlfriend (she collects snails, so this is a perfect gift for her).

Finally, some of us walked to an Antik store and purchased vintage beads. J-ME found some exquisite old German foil lampwork cabochons (which she will be sharing with many at Bead & Button) and a few other interesting pieces for her own stash. One person loaded up on two tone uranium glass beads they found.

We have a private showing of some very special lampwork beads, made by a very wonderful artist.

We had our dinner in a cave restaurant ending the day (or so we thought).

 

 Guy's meal of the most delicious steak we have ever tasted. 

The real end of the day saw us eating ice cream deserts and cappuccino.

J- Me and Guy are the owners of Wild Things Beads, a small family run import business specializing in Czech glass beads and buttons and finding the unusual to bring to their warehouse. They also run working bead tours to Jablonec and Hong Kong. Their warehouse is located deep in the Sierra Nevada foothills of Northern California, and can be reached by phone at (530)743 1339 or on the web at www.wildthingsbeads.com. They are also open by appointment at their warehouse.