Wood and Bone Natural Look

Being African American I love the natural look of the wood, bone and horn combinations. I find there is so much you can do with them whether you use leather, or string the beads on wire. I found it is also a great way to branch out into men's jewelry too.

This piece here is one that I like to knock around with. It was real simple to make. I used 4mm leather and tied a slip knot to secure the groups of beads in place. I made it adjustable so that the necklace length can be long or short depending on my mood.






This next piece was my first piece for men, I actually made for my dad. It's groups of wooden beads separated by single carved bone tubes. The focal point is a carved bone arrow head with curved golden horn tubes on either side. This was strung on beading wire.

Jewelry Home Shows

One of the things that I have found to be very profitable, especially around the holidays, is having jewelry home shows. If you do it well you can usually increase your year round client base. The following is based on my experiences doing home parties.

First of all decide when and where it will be and what the host incentive will be. It's always good business, I believe, to give the host something whether it be a piece of jewelry or part of your profit. For my upcoming home parties the hosts receive 10% of what I profit at the party. Don't forget to send out invitations or fliers. It's also a good idea to have some refreshments, usually the host will do that.

Next BE PREPARED. Make sure you have plenty of finished pieces to sell. You will probably not be able to display all of them at once so just keep putting up new ones as you sell. Don't just throw your pieces on a table but set up your display. Have a nice cloth and set things up to highlight different pieces. There are lots of different ways to make inexpensive displays. Also don't forget packaging. You can use the little plastic bags to put individual pieces in but you also need a larger bag to put total purchases in. Don't forget around the holidays people like to be able to get boxes, etc with their purchases. You can get creative with these too. As far as preparation goes the last thing to remember is to have plenty of change. Sales can be lost just by the mere fact that you don't have the right amount of change yet.

Finally, Marketing tips. Business cards and mailing list are a must for home shows. Business cards are easy to do with a computer and business cards from an office supply store, you can either get ones with designs already or put your own on a blank one. Include your contact information and your website if you have one. Let people know you are willing to do more home shows. If possible have a catalog of your pieces that people can take with them, make sure you mark clearly though which ones are "one of a kind pieces".

Well, that's just what I have learned from doing home shows, I welcome other people to share their experiences.

Multi strand look

I had several people asking for some multi strand pieces so I thought I would experiment and see how I liked it. When I first thought about it the first thing that came to mind was "uugh", I didn't think I would like it, but as I got started I actually enjoyed making them. The best thing I like about multi strand pieces is the diversity you get in just one piece. You can leave the strands hanging loose, twist them, or twist them more and you get totally different looks. If you haven't tried making one yet it's definitely something to think about. This green and black one is one of my first pieces.