The secret of the history of beaded jewelry of the peoples of the North. What do the colors and ornaments of the traditional culture of the Khants hide and why they are so valued among cultural experts. Elegant needlework, beading, and necklace weaving. As a hobby turned into a direction of jewelry art. What stylists advise to combine beads with and what does quarantine have to do with it.
Have you noticed the excitement around the online stores that have flooded with beads, rings, handbags, bracelets and other accessories made of beads? The design idea turned folk needlework into a popular direction of jewelry art. On social networks (especially on Instagram) there is a great demand for beaded jewelry. Masters of beadwork were literally inundated with orders.
The interest in this particular type of decorative and applied art was fueled by strict self-isolation and a general quarantine announced by the authorities. It became extremely difficult for many people to sit for several weeks without doing anything at all. Therefore, people have found a hobby and even managed to turn it into a hard coin, creating their own jewelry brands and their own online stores.
So, along with the already well-known brands of jewelry, completely new ones appeared, such as Pofene or Vos Studio. Professional designers also supported the trend of demand for products made of simple material.
But about everything in order.
The history of the appearance of beaded jewelry
Beads are one of the traditional materials: they are easy to use for making jewelry, as well as, literally, to weave into clothing items.
On the territory of modern Russia, it appeared around the XVII century, when different settlements and entire peoples began to actively establish communication with each other. To do this, use of natural materials — fur, rawhide and leather.
At first, the strange small beads were brought by trade caravans from the east, and then the western trade routes that passed through major cities became available. The locals quickly appreciated the advantages of beads: they are light, beautiful, wear-resistant and very convenient for making traditional patterns.
Folk craftsmen quickly adapted the new decorative material — beadwork and geometric ornaments fell to the liking of many peoples of the north and firmly entered their everyday life.
Among the ancient peoples, many elements of clothing, and even more so jewelry, had a sacred character. Some were supposed to scare away evil spirits, others contributed to a successful hunt, others protected the health of the owner and gave strength and wisdom.
It was believed that the miraculous properties appear only when the style of the wardrobe items creates a common ensemble. Ornamental traditions are carefully preserved by many peoples of the north. Modern designers do not argue with the wisdom of the ancients , but adapt beading techniques and create their own unique versions of jewelry for the venerable public.
It's all about the color
Art as a living being: it is constantly updated with stories, responding to the demands of modernity. In different regions of Russia beads vary significantly in their choice of color, size of beads, patterns and laws of building ornaments.
Take the Hunts and Muncies, whose colors and patterns in jewelry are now particularly popular:
- eastern Khanty prefer strict and traditional tones - green and its shades are often used;
- Muncies, on the contrary, like brightness and warm colors, including sunny orange.
What unites them is that both peoples use white beads as a basis, which can be compared to a white canvas for an artist.
As a result, everything depends on the meaning of the chosen pattern, because the patterns had their own names. Each one had a certain worldview: stories from myths, images of totem animals and natural phenomena.
It is impossible not to take into account the sacred values of ethnic ornaments. Thanks to the ability to vary and use in different semantic variants small glass beads-beaded jewelry (bracelets, necklaces made of beads, beads) became a fertile ground for creativity.
Elegant needlework
Jewelry made of colored beads has been gaining popularity for three years. The demand for them is growing gradually:
- in 2018, they were worn only by the brightest people who are not afraid to be the center of attention;
- in 2019, designers (for example, Jacquemus and Lanvin) became interested in beads and began to weave it into gold jewelry;
- in 2020, the trend took over the entire post-Soviet space — now hardly anyone will undertake to count the stores and brands that turn beading into a fashion industry.
The peculiarity and at the same time the main difficulty of using elegant beaded jewelry is that without a sense of style, it is impossible to make a mistake with the combination and not strengthen, but on the contrary, spoil the whole image. In creating costumes, you should carefully monitor the relationship of different elements in order to maintain harmony when jewelry is not only appropriate, but also desirable.
Elegant needlework: tips for use
What do the designers and stylists themselves say about this:
- jewelry made of beads can be mixed (combine), for example, putting 2-3 bracelets on one hand at once, then they begin to interact with each other and create a charming creative chaos;
- they also look good with simple clothing - plain T-shirts and T-shirts, which will be combined with any color;
- for more formal events, it is better to choose calm tones and also create several layers or interweaving threads.
Some strict rules have not yet been formed, which is why the designer version of folk jewelry meets with different outfits.
Beaded bracelets and other accessories for many of us are associated with childhood, when in school years many were fond of weaving baubles from colorful beads of different sizes and brightness. With this effect, fashion is already moving from the category of generally accepted canons to the level of personal feelings, where almost any liberties are allowed to form an individual style.
Fashion jewelry made of beads
Briefly about which brands (new or already existing for a long time) produce jewelry made of beads.
The Care Luvmade brand is no stranger to the fashion world. Its founder is stylist and designer Lyubiana Cauri. The motifs of her products are based on African and Afro-Brazilian cultures, ocean waves, surfing, jungles and volcanoes of the island of Bali.
Young jewelry brand Sasha Manovich (daughter of the owner of the Metropol Fashion Group) named after the designer himself-Maniovich AM Store. Her products are cute and romantic bracelets and pendants, you can try them on in GUM in Moscow.
Beaded Breakfast owes its appearance to quarantine. The creators of knitted clothing under the Mirstores brand, a married couple Alexey and Ekaterina, have made beading a separate branch of their business. 
They create earrings, rings, and pendants that look like a chain of beaded links.
The Rumi brand is famous for stylized letters and inscriptions on bracelets and necklaces made of beads.
The quarantine also "helped" model and actress Anna Zosimova to create the brand Pofene. Simple, cute and tasteful-her jewelry is bright, colorful and filled with spring motifs.
The same idea came to the model and actress Irina Martynenko: in self-isolation, she began to create all sorts of beaded jewelry, including unusual belts and even men's accessories. Her brand is called Busiki.bijoux.
The new Hiaynderfyt brand is distinguished by its unique audacity. Each piece of beads carries a certain meaning: not always obvious, but with a subtle irony. As the central pattern of chokers, rings and chains for glasses, we see not only the standard flowers and leaves, but also the familiar emoticons (emoji) from social networks.