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Hi Frankie, who was making this faux amber then? Nice warm hues, was it bought on your last Moroccan trip? (i have very similar "amber" from a necklace I bought in Yemen a long time ago.
Hi Chantal!
I have now been told by a kind EJ friend that these are not the German/African type but are good quality - not new.
No, it was not bought from Morocco at all. I bought the "amber" beads from a lady in Wales!! The metal beads came from Sarah.
I will try to find out more about the (reputedly) German "amber" bead origin. I`m sure Jamey "Beadman" on the BCN site will say something about it. I`ll let you know.
Online information has it that it that phenolic resin "amber" beads were commercially developed and released in 1926. They were produced in the inter-war years after that in Gdansk and Staatliche Bernstein-Manufaktur Konigsberg.
The early imported into Africa imitation amber beads are a good example of the fake becoming often more valuable than real amber beads.However I`ve never come across real amber beads as big.
Hi frankie,
Such erudition! Many thanks. Is phenolic the one which comes from the resin of a tree? I know that I should know by now as we had lots of explanations from the best experts but my little dysfunctional brain just became more confused!
Have you made the necklace yourself then? I have bought of few beads of genuine amber -I think- but as you said they were small, and they look a wee bit distorted , rough and very unassuming.....Not like the glorious sunshine of the faux amber ones....
Chantal, erudition yes but not mine!
I did string the necklace together. I love those real Maroccan small amber heads and their crookedness. It just hightlights their handmade quality.Your few may well be more valuable than this where the beads have a mechanical quality to them in my opinion. Even so they are still very attractive I think (would not have bought them otherwise).
The stuff which comes out of trees is sap at first then becomes copal when hardened. At this stage it is still relatively young. Many aeons later it has become harder and is called amber.
There`s a great definition for phenolic resin in Wikipedia. Just don`t ask me to relate it, please. It shows chemical equations which are quite beyond my poor brain!
Should have added that I think that real amber can be called a resin, too.
This is very beautiful. Resin amber is one of my necessities for putting together a beautiful assemblage of beads. Carnelian is number 1, turquoise is number 2, coral is number 3 and amber is 4.
Yesterday I sold an old Yemen necklace made in Yemen many decades ago of *cherry amber* beads capped with Bawsani silver filigree for each bead. And lovely old terminals and chain. I am happy it went to a friend, so that I can see it occasionally. ;)
I`m glad you like it, Anna. It has been perhaps the start of a Swaps section here. I have agreed a part swap, part sale on it already. Mine went to a friend, too, like your lovely cherry/Bawsani one
Congratulations! So far, I have been so fortunate to have found good homes for all the pieces I have sold during the last 6 months. I only began dispersing my collection at that time. I still have many good homes to find ;) The first pieces were sold during little trunk shows at my home, because my friends wanted the first chance at purchasing them. So I see the pieces gracing the chest and arms of four different women that I see almost every week end. There are some others that I don't see so often. But the many very nice people that I have met on the internet have always had a real interest in preserving the ethnic jewelry that they buy.
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