As early as 4,000 years ago, the first glass beads were made. Later, in ancient Rome, glass beads were made predominantly to imitate expensive jewels and in the 15th century you could trade glass beads for anything you wanted: Oil, gold, silver and even African slaves were exchanged for glass beads. And on the subject of beads and trading there was a weekend on August 26 and 27, 2006 when hobby bead artists and designers from all over Germany and the world, met in the Farbglashuette Lauscha, and the entire weekend revolved around the world of the glass bead.

Early on Saturday a large group of people already pressed around all of the torches in the Farbglashuette Lauscha where Nina Marschner, Ana Maria DiLuca, Jana Brinkmann and Hermann Heinickel sat to demonstrate for the public.

For bead designers and for other visitors, it was wonderful to see how glowing glass is pulled into glass rods, and then see how the glass rods are transformed into beautiful tiny works of art – glass beads – in front of the flame.

For visitors, there was plenty to experience during Bead Design Days. With the help of a bead designer, even children could wind their own bead in front of the torch and could take home with them as a memento. 

For those who wanted to have a necklace right away, Carol Anne Beckman was ready to help with bead stringing and the tools to attach a clasp. And for the small guests, there was a coloring competition whose best results were rewarded with prizes.

Bead Design Days Competition 2006 – Fire Magic

Our visitors voted for the most beautiful entries in our “Fire Magic” bead contest.

The prize winners were as follows:
Michi Farnberger
Isabelle Merkel
Petra Kayali

159 valid ballots were cast and the most beautiful works were selected from the 37 entries

"The Biggest Bead"

On Sunday, guests were invited to see a very special and interesting event: Ulla Schwan and Jana Brinkmann, two Glass-blowers of the Farbglashuette, started their world record attempt to make the world’s largest solid glass bead ever made in front of a lampworking torch. With a great deal of interest and encouragement from the large group of spectators, both worked closely together for 90 minutes to wind the bead until it was bigger and bigger.

At the end of the sweaty hard work, after blisters from the excessive heat, the goal was reached, at least in the opinions of the visitors, and a 10.4 centimetre bead weighing 1.4 kilograms was put into the kiln to slowly cool until Monday afternoon when it was removed intact.

The Farbglashuette Lauscha thanks all the bead designers who participated and helped make the third annual Bead Design days special and interesting, and wants to thank all the visitors who attended Bead Design Days. Altogether we counted over 800 visitors which lets us know that we should start planning the 4th annual Bead Design Days in Lauscha right away!