Fun Facts About Camilla Belle’s Trade Beads Featured in the “Where Can I Find” section of Instyle
WHO: Camilla Belle, InStyle Magazine July 2009 Issue
WHAT: Instyle July 2009 Issue Featuring Camilla Belle for HELP
Malawi wearingthe African Trade Bead Bracelets in
the “Where Can I Find” section.
WHEN: July 2009
Fun Facts about Camilla’s Bracelets:
The term “Trade Beads” typically applies to beads made predominately in Venice and Bohemia and other European countries from the late 1400s through the early 1900s. These beads were typically traded in Africa and the Americas. Several of these beads are also believed to be made in Germany, France and the Netherlands.
The heyday of this “trade” period was from the mid 1800s through the early 1900s when millions of these beads were produced and traded in Africa. The Venetians dominated this market and produced the majority of the beads sold during this time. The J.F. Sick and Co, a company based in Germany and Holland, was one of the largest bead brokers/importers during this period.
The popularity of these beads was revived in the late 1960s when they began to be exported from Africa to the United States and Europe. The term “Trade Beads” became very popular during this time period and still refers to the same types of beads today. For example, the millefiori beads were called “Love Beads” and used in necklaces with peace symbols during the Hippie era.
As the popularity of these old beads grew they began recieving different names. We started hearing terms like “Russian Blues”, “Dutch Donuts”, “King Beads”. Although some of these folklore names are totally meaningless…ie”Lewis and Clarke” beads…they do describe a specific type of bead.
Today, these trade beads are more even popular. Thousands of these beads are in private collections around the world. African traders are having to dig deeper and deeper underneath Africa’s soil to find the beads which were more available just 5 years ago.
There are exceptional museum collections of trade beads at the Museum of Mankind in London, the Pitt River Museum in Oxford, the Royal Museum of Central Africa in Belgium, the Murano Museum of Glass in Italy, the Tropical Royal Institute of Amsterdam, the Bead Museum in Arizona, U.S. and the Picard Trade Bead Museum in California, U.S.
One of the most intriguing aspects to these beads is how they have survived a hundred or more years of wear and the travel through at least three different continents.
