Beads Come of Age

Their work has a decidedly modern, vibrant twist that makes it uniquely their own. For starters, the beads themselves are often a global affair. A bracelet might sport rare German vintage glass beads from the 1920s and '30s, antique African trading or vintage Japanese metal beads. Colors are brighter, louder than before. Geometric shapes and intricate loom-woven patterns abound. Some artists tell stories in their work, while others use meditative free-form patterns. They all pop with modern panache.

Here are a handful of top fashion beaders from across the country.

Chan Luu

Chan Luu arrived in the United States from Vietnam in 1972 during the Vietnam War. She studied fashion and was working as a buyer when she had a serendipitous meeting with an Indian holy man. He was wearing a "worn but cool, colored-thread bracelet from a local temple," Luu says, and her life was transformed. Inspired, she created her own wrap bracelet using leather cord and handmade sterling silver nugget beads. It was her namesake jewelry and fashion line's first offering and, "amazingly, it's still our best seller," says Luu, who lives in Los Angeles.

Today she has 12 design assistants who help produce her prolific patterns in colors galore. All the beaded jewelry is handcrafted by female artisans in Vietnam, and Luu says her great joy is in helping poor villagers "by creating a sustainable commerce, so they can feed their families and put their kids through school." Prices for the global brand range from $170 to $295.

www.chanluu.com

Suzanna Dai

Suzie Gallehugh, a native Texan, struck out on her own in 2008 with the first offering in her beaded jewelry line, a necklace she called Kathmandu. Soon thereafter, on a trip to India she met with artisans and had samples made. When she returned to her home base of New York City, she created a few more pieces, and within a few months her line was picked up by Bergdorf Goodman and Calypso St. Barth.

Bold and large, though lightweight, Gallehugh's beaded jewelry is not for women who want to just blend in. She beads new designs in full swatches, which are then sent to her producers in India. "So often women tell me they'd love to wear my jewelry but they're too shy, and I tell them, just try it, you'll like it," she says. Her line is sold internationally and ranges from $80 to $450, with custom orders available.

www.suzannadai.com

Chilie Rose Beadz

As a psychotherapist in the 1980s, Adonnah Langer first beaded at her West Los Angeles dining room table to unwind. In 1989, after making "healing" bracelets for clients, she started making her trademark bold bracelets and went public, so to speak. Langer, now based in Santa Fe, N.M., designs 30 varieties of her sterling silver clasps with turquoise, gemstones, onyx, sponge coral and carnelian, working with seed, brass, pearl, fire-polished and pony beads to create bright texture and differentiate her pieces from Native American beadwork.

Although she still does "the major beading" herself, she now has three beaders, two silversmiths and two leather workers who help her produce more than 2,000 bracelets a year. "The oldest man-made artifact found is a bead," says Langer, whose work is in many catalogs, including Sundance Catalog. "[They] were an attempt to express a spiritual representation of the great mystery of life. It's an old, deep pull and we love the color. Beads are playful and primal." Her designs are sold throughout the U.S. and range from $250 to $1,400.

www.peyotebird.com.

Roarke New York

Working as a buyer for Bergdorf Goodman in New York City, Laetitia Stanfield learned how to successfully sell to those key store buyers: Have top-quality merchandise and great branding and know well your target market. She hooked up with another Bergdorf buyer to create Roarke New York in 2009, offering what's become their signature chiffon beaded necklaces after they saw an opening in the fashion market for something beaded that could take a woman from jeans to black tie.

Raised in New York City, Paris and Virginia, Stanfield says the beautiful necklaces that drip sparkle, color and pattern are made by Indian bead workers -- all men -- who make each piece in about 10 days. Now solo, Stanfield, who is based in New York, does the designing, sales, inventory, press, accounting and website. "I'm a one-woman show," she says. "It helps that the reaction to the necklaces has been amazing." She also sells bracelets and even a bridal line of neckties and bow ties for men and garters for brides. The bold pieces are sold internationally, and prices range from $60 to $725.

www.roarkenyc.com

Julie Rofman Jewelry

Julie Rofman uses uniform-sized delicate Japanese matte, translucent, opaque and shiny glass seed beads to create her modern twist on native design. Drawing from her background as a painter, Rofman started out beading on small looms while in graduate school. Through a friend's fair-trade store, Rothman connected with the Guatemalan women who now loom her beads.

Her jewelry incorporates 40 colors and intricate styles, and she says the design process is meditative. There's no drawing; it's a freehand, fluid process in which each line builds on the next. "It's interpretive, based on what happens below," says Rothman, who creates in her Northern California studio. "I get lost in it." She gets inspiration from Bauhaus and Kandinsky, as well as mid-'50s architects and loves the "incredible attention to detail that makes such things almost artwork." Her bracelets and necklaces sell worldwide, and prices range from $75 to $265.

www.julierofmanjewelry.com

Assad Mounser

From her first collection in 2009, New York-based designer Amanda Assad Mounser's big, bold beaded jewelry became a darling of fashion editorial. One of her first pieces, Moonage Daydream Collar from her 2010 collection, is her bestselling design and is still frequently seen in fashion publications around the world. It was while working in fashion public relations and sales in New York that Mounser started making the jewelry for herself. When she wore the pieces, stores and editors took notice.

Mounser designs all the collections herself, and pieces are handmade at her New York studio by a team of artisans and craftspeople. She says her target market is "a free spirit with an edge. I like the idea of sewing beads onto chain. It allows the pieces to take on a shape of their own. Pieces can go from being jewelry to art." Her work is sold internationally, and prices range from $125 to $995.

www.assadmounser.com

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