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Manhattan Bead Company relocates to new spot on Mill St.

April 1, 2019   ·   0 Comments

By Constance Scrafield

The Manhattan Bead Company is alive and well on Mill Street. That beautiful shop window on Broadway, filled with many wonders of so large a variety of beads, wire, completed pieces of jewellery to show how it is done, has been supplanted by an equally fascinating space in the indoor mall at 18 Mill Street, just off Broadway.

We dropped in for a conversation about the move and the business now.

“I had 2,900 square feet on Broadway and I only used the front 1,000 feet,” said owner Anita Okada. “Here, I moved into 550 square feet and that is working well.”

There is lots and lots of stock but they are mainly quite small individual pieces.

“In 2004, I was making jewellery and trying to sell it but I was accumulating too much product at home. I wanted to find a way to sell my jewellery and supplies in the same place. I found that little place at 98 Broadway but, after two or three years, I moved because I needed more space. Then, I moved to 111 Broadway.

Going back further, “In 2000, I met a person who taught me how to make glass beads. I couldn’t find the pieces I wanted to make my own jewellery. So, I started with that and sourced findings.” 

Findings are all the bits that go into making a single piece of jewellery: gold, sterling silver or base metal chain, string, wire, rope of some sort or leather; sterling silver (or gold, generally) or base metal settings, with or without stones and the stones themselves; beads made of a very long list of materials; clasps for necklaces, hooks or studs for earrings, and holders for rings and bracelets, also made of silver or base metal; leather or other soft materials which are usually woven or etched. 

Thus, might one begin to understand the range of products to be found at the Manhattan Bead Company.

Since making glass beads was Ms. Okada’s entrée into establishing her shop business, we wanted to learn more about beads. She was happy to be our guide. Glass beads are as varied as glass itself. Her beads are medium to bigger, of plenty of diverse base colours, shapes and variegation. Each one is unique, as the making is a hand craft.

She talked about furnace glass: the multi-coloured glass beads are elongated, with larger holes through their middle, to be strung on thicker material or to be more moveable. 

Other beads can be ceramic, decorated and lacquered paper maché, brass, copper, many styles and shapes, all drilled through the middle to be strung one way or another. Wooden beads, so beautiful, are there, with etched or burnt decoration, in different sizes. All this is to make designs of jewellery that are each one-offs and to create a impressive world of choice.

Even the teeny “seed beads” are drilled with appropriately minuscule holes for stringing. They are widely used in Indigenous bead work. For this writer, a mystery was solved. Dozens or hundreds of seed beads are strung and then woven on a loom into the bead mats one finds or for other uses, as well as being added decoratively to moccasins and (usually leather) clothing. 

Ms Okada sells the looms.

“I sell all kinds of wire, semi-precious stones, sea pearls, Swarovski crystals, string material, glue and wooden beads. I do sell some jewellery that I make, including bracelets. And I go to the Gem Show in Tucson in February,” she explained, showing that she is serious about jewellery.

The very famous, 65-year-old gem show is one of the leading and largest gem shows in North America and among the largest in the world, a monster of several shows, actually, that lasts for 2 1/2 weeks. Thousands of people attend it from around the world: professional jewellers and a huge number of artists, people with interests in many related matters, including fossils, go every year. 

Those in the jewellery business head there to look and learn about new styles and new ideas. Nearly 4,000 companies attend, with displays of their best in stones, crystals and all the massive range of items that belong to the gem and fossil world, in over 40 locations throughout Tucson. 

It is a wild time and most people who go to it, want to go back every year.

“I have to import a lot of my stock from the States,” said Ms. Okada. “The suppliers I buy from import their stock too, from overseas.

Although the Manhattan Bead Company shop is away from Broadway to a path less travelled, Ms. Okada is content to pay much less rent and, as she observed, “there is a parking lot behind.” 

Her shop is still beautiful and an excellent place to find everything one needs to start with, for making jewellery. For those who are well versed and know what they want, they may still discover surprises in the fulsomeness of her range of stock.

Her advice to budding jewellery makers: “Take your time and decide what you want to do. Then, I can talk to them. I don’t do lessons anymore but I talk people through it, just on the counter here. I show them how to do things. A lot of information is on the Internet for people to look at.”

She commented, “I’m really fussy about the quality of my stock. That’s why I go to the States.”

Furthermore, of her current location, “I am happy with it now.”

For more information, contact Ms. Okada at her shop telephone number, 519-943-1299 or by email at info@manhattanbeadco.com

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