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I'm planning a mosaic/Turkish lamp class, and currently looking at seed beads for the infill. Something like the image below:

enter image description here

A lot of the seed beads I'm finding online are silver lined. I have two worries about these:

  1. That they might block more light than non-silver lined ones, and
  2. that the silver lining might be too visible and not fit the aesthetic.

Does anyone have any experience with seed beads and translucent mosaics?

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I don't have experiences with translucent mosaiks, but silver lined beads will create a very different look than your example image.

The main goal of silver lining beads is to make them more visible on a background like fabric. Light is reflected off the silver in the center (instead of just passing through and being absorbed by the fabric) and makes the bead stand out more, especially on dark fabric. But all that assumes the bead is being hit by light from the outside.

If you try shining a light through a silber lined bead, you'll see a very dark line going through the center with only a halo of color around it. It will certainly not look as brilliant as the lamp in your question.

Maybe you're looking for the wrong kind of material here... there are transparent plastic "raindrop pearls" available in many home decoration stores that might work better than actual beads because the don't have any holes in them. I've often seen similar shaped decor stones, pearls or nuggets (plasric and even glass) in several sizes and colors in home decor stores. Here's a random example from Amazon (not affiliated):

enter image description here

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  • I know I'm supposed to avoid saying thanks, but this is the perfect answer. Thank you so much for telling me about raindrop pearls
    – Library Seph
    Commented Apr 7, 2023 at 23:00

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