Designing With Wedding Cakes By Bethany Keiper*

Question: "I love the look of wedding cake beads, but I have a hard time matching them with other beads for a bracelet or necklace. Do you have any ideas about what might look good with them?"

(CLICK ON THE UNDERLINED TEXT IN THE BODY OF THIS ARTICLE TO SEE PICTURES OF THE BEADS)

The Beading Times: Of all beads, wedding cakes are my favorites. These beautiful opaque or translucent beads, with their blue and yellow frit dots, goldstone trailings and swirled rosebuds, have an elegance no other bead can match. Unfortunately, since no other bead can really match them, they can be difficult to incorporate into a design.
With a little creativity, you can find ways to make the most of these beautiful beads in all of their different shapes -- round, oval, teardrop and tube.
Try Czech fire polished or Austrian crystal facetted bright pink or maroon beads to match the rosettes on the smaller wedding cakes. Round beads covered with goldstone look great when paired with the larger opaque wedding cakes. This combination highlights the goldstone swirls that wedding cakes are known for having.
 No matter what the size of the wedding cake beads, a bead cap can create a fluidity in your designs. Since most wedding cake beads are handcrafted, they vary in size, so plan accordingly.
For smaller, round wedding cakes, try repeating the trio of a solid black or white bead (about 5mm round (druk), a slightly raised bead cap, and wedding cake bead. The cap should cup the wedding cake bead. This design also works well with teardrop wedding cakes and a prominent bead cap.
Translucent wedding cakes look great paired with bead caps, coupled with smaller accent beads, and followed by round glass beads (druks) in the same translucent color as the wedding cakes. Using smaller beads the same color as the wedding cakes not only looks lovely, but also helps you stretch your wedding cake budget for a project.
Try combining large, oval wedding cakes with goldstone-covered beads, 6mm black beads, and a flat bead cap. Facetted, metallic, rose-colored rondelles look great with any size or shape of wedding cake bead. Small, flower-shaped metal beads also work well, since a rose is the exact center of a wedding cake bead.