Ecuadorian Hands has sponsored many tagua beads giveaways here.  If you are new to these natural beads, then let me say these beads made from the nuts of Central American palm trees are beautiful!  They are cut into shape, dyed and polished to a beautiful shine.

Approximately $40 worth of tagua beads

I received the above batch of tagua beads for review.  There were all sorts of shapes and colors.  They certainly had the look of gemstones but are much lighter. They feel warm to the touch too and are wonderful to wear next to the skin.


Tagua nut beads are also known as plant ivory beads because they share the same natural hue as elephant ivory and are great for carving too.  They are a viable alternative to elephant ivory.  See more about tagua beads here. Did you know that elephants are still being killed for their tusks even though there is a world wide ban? 

Many designers who work with tagua beads like to use other natural components like leather and perhaps wooden beads.  So I decided to try something different and designed a tagua necklace using only metal wire and beads. Yes, this was a personal challenge piece!


The largest ones I received had very generously sized holes for leather cords to pass through. In my case, the holes accommodated two 20G wires!  I used brass beads and jeweler's bronze wire for this design. You can easily see the lovely natural striations in the bead.

The open design led to a large statement necklace which wasn't heavy at all with the tagua bead framed as the focal.


Giveaway
If you'd like to win the $40 worth of tagua beads to create your own awesome designs,  please make a comment below. Make sure you leave contact info if you do not have an online shop or blog.

Subscribers need to click on the post title to come to my actual blog. Scroll down and enter your comment. Pick Name/URL. If you don't have a store or blog, leave the URL blank.

This giveaway is international.

Extra entries if you become or are a blog subscriber or follower etc. If you also do shout outs about this giveaway, those will count as additional entries too! Please say so in the comments.

It ends in a week's time at 6 pm EST Monday,  April 1 , 2013. I will pick the winner randomly and announce the results as soon as possible after. So be sure to leave a contact email if you don't have an online link or make sure you come back and check! Otherwise I will redraw in a week. Good luck!


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Original Post by THE BEADING GEM
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