Beading in the Native American Tradition

Rating:
Summary: I recommend the library first...
Review: I am new to Native American beading and was very pleased to purchase David Dean's book. Beautifully photographed, wonderful examples explaining the culture of choices in historical work, excellent instruction for planning and crafting contemporary projects. I especially enjoyed Mr. Dean's background material on Native tribes as it related to their beadwork. I came away from the book not only with a best understanding of how Native American beadwork is done but with a sincere appreciation and respect for the peoples who mastered the craft.

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful book!
Review: I am new to Native American beading and was very pleased to purchase David Dean's book. Beautifully photographed, wonderful examples explaining the culture of choices in historical work, excellent instruction for planning and crafting contemporary projects. I especially enjoyed Mr. Dean's background material on Native tribes as it related to their beadwork. I came away from the book not only with a best understanding of how Native American beadwork is done but with a sincere appreciation and respect for the peoples who mastered the craft.

Rating:
Summary: Best bead book you can get
Review: If you can only have one book on Native American beadwork, this is the one to have. It is filled with wonderful illustrations and instructions on doing your own beadwork. Even better, the illustrations show a gallery of old and modern beadwork to inspire you. The text is lucid and carries the reader along through history and technique. The writer, himself a Native American artist, conveys his deep love of his art. A great read and a marvelous textbook. Get this one!

Rating:
Summary: Best book???? ... Not this one!
Review: OK, another nice book with nice illustrations, and nice instructions. But to be honest, I was sorry for the money I had wasted on a book that I had hoped to complement "Native American Beadwork: Traditional Beading Techniques for the Modern-Day Beadworker" by Georg J. Barth which has been around for almost ten years now (Stevens Point, WI: Schneider Publishers 1993, available through Amazon.com). David Dean's book, however, doesn't add substantially to my knowledge of Native American beading; a lot of cultural or tribal attribution of the objects shown is wrong though anyone only superficially familiar with tribal styles could make a better guess!

Barth's book is a much better source of information if you really want to learn how to bead in the Native American tradition; it's become a classic and has been quoted in the latest volume on Plains Indians of the Smithsonian "Handbook of North American Indians."

Rating:
Summary: I recommend the library first...
Review: When possible, I take a book out of the library before I buy it. Hey, 3-6 weeks of free review, can't beat that. Anyway, I would recommend getting this book, but at a discounted price (from here or another online source). If you are like me and do beading as a craft, I personally I found some of the photos and diagrams quite helpful, but some of the instructions and other diagrams were a little hard to follow. If nothing else, you can get design ideas from it! I would rate parts of the text as moderately helpful, depending on your interest level.