Here you can see hand reaching above a necklace of fimo beads which Jamey personally created for Naomi.

Naomi has over six hundred finished pieces in her collection and only one hundred were available for viewing at our March meeting of the Northern California Bead Society.

Its great collection. Thank so much for pictures...

These are the best images I could create because there were so many people in front of the tables at all times. However, Jamey Allen has carefully documented this collection and you may ask him whether he may be wllling to share better images.

You mentioned "She says "No, but I am interested in buying more"!

Does she feel sticker shock? For me its becoming mentally not possible to buy beads in last 5 or so years, as i can't make myself pay 10-20 times more for something i buy not so long ago, for so much less...

Thanks for reply

I can only imagine that if Naomi is like I am, she thinks she is getting better at collecting. -But perhaps: we are only digging deeper!

Personally, I feel that there are occasionally a few bargains at the extreme high end. Fewer collectors have the experience and courage to pay high prices; and therefore, there is less competition.

You right about high end, but I think its ONLY in relative terms... Let me illustrate it with something i know well

Say in 1989, 35-40mm 2eyes gzi will cost you 1K USD and 3eyes of same size and same conditions will cost you 5K... Today it will be 30K vs 75K i.e. 30 times vs only 15 times. so there is clear true in what you saying relatively speaking, but in absolute term its still mind boggle numbers!

My feeling that bargains come in some very obscure areas of bead collecting, something that totally under radar of everyone. I am sure every area of bead collecting has something like this - obscure, unloved, little known (no matter what you collecting - stone, metal or glass). This where bargains to be found - but its not going to be low end or high end, it will be something in medium price range.

Sometimes I am very happy that I am still fairly new to collecting. There are still plenty of beads that are cheap that are interesting to me. I love a good strand of Prosser beads or some mixed Venetian trade beads. There are for example so many fancy beads that I do not have, even the plain ones, that any mixed strand is interesting. I presume that over time, I may become more picky. Now, the most expensieve single beads I have bought are a 7 layer chevron bought in Morocco, and a Jatim bead from Indonesia.
And many of my most cherished beads were actually gifts.
My house is worth about 150.000 USD, So I guess that equals 2 3-eye Zi beads? ;-)

As everything else, you have to answer it to yourself - why you collecting beads. if reason for your collections - is having something historically significant and beautiful, something you want to look at and enjoy - then current price and future price is NO concern to you. As many pointed out - there are plenty of beads to buy and enjoy.

However, there are many other reasons to collect beads and this is just short list: portable wealth/investment; protection/magical qualities (some of us have very strong religious believes); piece of our own history/history of our families,friends; etc. etc. etc.. And depending on what is more important for you - price appreciation can be more or less or no concern to you.

I personally have very specific interest, in very specific bead types, that come from very specific are of the Planet, where me and my family current and future home is and will be, so i dont even know if I can call myself collector...

I don't have ANY beads from Africa or Venetian Trade Beads, or Roman Glass or American beads or beads from Indonesia, and have no plans to have them. They just don't interest me, but your and my interests are different, and this is good thing!

You are right, it is a very personal thing. For me collecting beads is about two things: understanding history and making jewelry. By studying and collecting beads, I learn about the history of places I live and visit. It serves as my focus to understand the world around me. For example: studying the Prosser beads and writing the book on beads from Briare made me see what the industrial revolution really meant. Studying Czech beads makes me understand key European historical moments, such as WWI, the end of WWII and the 1989 revolution.
Also, it is a way to focus my travels. I try to find something bead related with every trip. It helps me get away from only being a tourist.
And there are many more things that collecting beads mean to me, which may be very different than other people's interests. I like how one and the same bead can mean many different things to different people.

I also agree with both of reasons - specially jewerly part of it. What the point to have IT if you dont wear IT.

I been very fortunate in my life as I always had chance to wear beads i really loved and enjoy to wear, that give me both protection and blessing.

I only wish I had more skills to string them properly and be able to make nice necklasses I could wear and I hope Jake will come to the rescue and makes something very nice from my beads!

One of the things I love about beads is that there are millions of very beautiful examples that just about anyone can afford. Sure, at any given time there are small segments of the market where fashion rules. Zi is one of them right now, driven - in part, at least - by the Chinese plutocracy's mystification of everything it is in the process of wiping out in Tibet. But prices don't always keep on increasing. With zi perhaps they will, at least for as long as it is still thought to be possible to distinguish fakes from authentic beads, but the history of art markets is full of bubbles that have collapsed.

For the most part, bead prices seem to have remained on average quite stable. If you compare the prices that Robert Liu gives in his book Collectible Beads there's generally not a whole lot of difference between then and now. And perhaps, looking at the demographics of the market, prices may actually drop in the next ten or fifteen years.

All taste is a mix of socially informed convention and deeply personal drives. The two bead types that personally I find the most beautiful, Phoenicians and Kiffa, still offer examples that I can buy for the price of a good, or sometimes a mediocre, dinner. It amazes me that that is the case, because these beads, which are quite rare and fragile, give me pleasure for much longer.

Everybody on this forum has different tastes. I would never even have discovered Phoenicians or Kiffa without Thomas and Gabriel, and I'm grateful to them for getting me hooked. But if there's one collector here who inspires me it's Finfan, who lives - he tells us - on a quite limited budget and still manages every year to buy a lot of beautiful and interesting beads.

Cheers,

Will

I have feeling, I seen it before. I think, mala has been made from pieces of pure gzi? something like this. but i dont remember, so i can be 100% wrong

From 2009--this photo of the necklace I made for Naomi Lindstorm in about 2007. It is a conventional two-strand necklace--and not a "mala." JDA.