| The beads on this page are hand made polymer clay beads fashioned to imitate copal amber. Copal amber, from the Copal tree in Africa, is so highly prized that broken and damaged beads are repaired with wire and sometimes are inlayed with turquoise or coral inclujsions. Several of the beads here are also "repaired" to resemble very expensive copal beads, now very scarce and difficult to find.
Various colors of Polymer clay are chosen and blended by hand, shaped, cured, colored, then hand sanded and polished. When a wire "repair" or stone inclusion is added, it is done during the soft clay stage, cured then glued in later to be sure it is secure. This process was invented and developed and taught by Tory Hughes.
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