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We start by learning how a bead mold is made.
First you take a blob of the grey clay.
Here are the tools we'll use. From left to right: A bit of the ubiquitous black plastic bag to put underneath. Wouldn't want
it to stick, would we? There are a couple of lids that are the size and shape we want. There are several tools for making
the holes in the mold where the powdered glass will go. The last tools are smoothing tools, we have to make the edges all
nice and smooth. The scissors won't be used in this step, they are for cutting the cassava twigs to size in another step later.
We will also use a small bowl of water when we are smoothing the mold.
After you make the basic shape, you trim around the lid to get the right size. Richard demonstrates the use of the tool.
He clears away the excess clay after trimming around the lid.
Next he smooths around the edge of the trimmed shape. The bowl at the left of the picture has water in it.
You need to smooth the edges, and the top of the mold.
Once the mold is a nice shape, you begin to make holes in it. The tool has been carved from a piece of wood, a branch from
something. I think they said cassava. The end of the tool is narrow, then a larger part. The narrow part leaves a smaller
hole, this is for the cassava twig. The twig will burn out during firing, leaving a hole in the bead. The narrow part in the
mold allows the twig to stand upright during the filling of the mold hole with powder.
Richard shows us the beginning of the placement of the holes.
(Day Two) Here are our molds that we made yesterday. We've now signed the backs. We put signatures for Carol and Diane. They've
gone off today to the Technical Institute where Diane's father taught when she was a teenager.
This is the set of tools used to powder the glass. I was intrigued by the reuse of available materials all through the trip.
We only saw one blacksmith, and that was in Agamenya later, but you know seeing this that blacksmithing is a necessary skill
here.
Daniel begins to demonstrate how the pounding is done. Richard is holding a bowl of the powdered glass which is the end product
that Daniel's demo will produce.
Notice in Richard's hand the shards of glass that are already broken at the beginning of this part of the process.
Richard shows us the beginning of the placement of the holes.
Glass shards at the bottom of the tank.
Jamey Allen tries his hand at the pounding. Richard did explain that Daniel is not the only one who powders glass, everyone
takes turns doing it. Daniel was so enthusiastic about his demo, and I did check to see how big his bicep was. Like men everywhere
he puffed up his arm to show his great strength!
Here's the powdered glass from the bottom of the mortar.
The powdered glass is sieved so that just the smallest particles are used.
The next step is to put sticks in the molds. This is a pile that was done before we arrived. Remember that these molds have
a small indentation at the bottom of the hole to accomodate the stick. At Cedi's workshop, the molds do not have this indentation,
therefore they can not prepare the molds with sticks ahead of time.
The thickness of the stick is important. Someone has already gathered cassava twigs for us to use, but we must notice the
thick and thin ends and cut them off.
Trish and Jamey insert sticks into their molds.
Concentration!
Now we will see how the powder glass is mixed with dyes to give it colors. Someone said these were soap dyes, but perhaps
the translation was muddled. It doesn't seem to be made out of glass anyway, which seems interesting!
The dyes and glass are mixed by hand. Yes, we wash our hands afterward! We was our hands outside the workshop, over the open
drain that is ubiquitous here in Ghana. Augustine kindly pours water from a jug for me.
The colors that we will use to make our beads.
Augustine and John discuss the pattern that John has chosen and how it will be made.
The easy patterns we make today are made by spilling powdered glass from your hand over the mold. You shake off excess, and
tamp it down. This part was clearly going to be easier with practice. You want the powdered glass to be tamped down, but not
too much depending on the desired effect. I chose to make a slanted pattern, and this meant that you had to tamp at an angle.
After the mold is filled, you can go back in with a tool and make a hole on one edge and then fill that. You make a single
hole in each bead hole on the same side in each of the holes in the mold. Then spilling powdered glass from your hand, or
a little cuplike metal piece, you filled the holes. Then tamp, and make another hole. I felt extremely clumsy!
Jamey's knees and bead mold in progress on the left, John's knees and work on the upper right.
Jamey and John take a well deserved smoke break at the end of the morning. I try to catch some breeze and watch for pied crows.
This morning I finally felt as if I was over the 5 hour jet lag when I got up and even made it up in time to have an omelet
in the breakfast room at the hotel.
The following is day three of the workshop.
Another pile of molds showing some variations in sizes and hole shapes.
On day three we get to see some of the beads that we made the day before fired. Wood gathered from the nearby area is burnt.
Richard feeds the kiln.
Front of the kiln where the bead molds are loaded.
Bead molds getting fired.
Trish, Richard, John, Augustine. During the firing the beads will need to be checked at intervals. Even with a thermostat
and programmable controller you'd have to check since there are so many variations among the glass types, and sizes of molds.
Richard looks at the molds, and pulls one out.
Richard pulls one of the beads up to check. Is it a bead yet?
Today we also try some more complicated bead patterns.
My blue beads. Yesterday I made pink beads. The pink beads turned out better!
We start by learning how a bead mold is made.
Trish and Richard work on their beads.
Jamey and Daniel work hard to make nice designs in the beads.
Here's my mold with the design finished.
The table where we worked and the tools we used. Richard and Trish's hands.
We start by learning how a bead mold is made.
We start by learning how a bead mold is made.
This bead was made in two pieces.
View of the hole.
Another view of the hole.
Here's the mold the bead was made in.
How the stick lays to make the hole.
We start by learning how a bead mold is made.
We haven't gotten to the grinding part yet, but here is a picture of the grinding stones. Later the kiln wash gets ground
off.
The following is the final day of the workshop at Darbaa.
Richard and Daniel grind the beads to clean them.
John watches as Richard and Daniel grind with a grinding machine. They wear no goggles or masks as they should.
Barbara's Beads
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