Rose Petal Beads, In Reality.

After having a dream about making beads out of rose petals, I thought I would attempt it. John had to do some yardwork for his dad, who happens to have an amazing array of roses blooming in his backyard. So I snipped a few off for myself, and set off on my project.

Rose petal beads were popular in Victorian times, and were mostly used in Christian prayer. I've known about them for a few years now, and am always intrigued by the fact that the beads retain their rosey smell.

I found a few vague tutorials online, so I was more or less winging it. It said what to do but left out important details and the measurements were all wrong. So here is how I did it. Was it a success? I'm not quite sure yet.

These are some of the materials needed. Roses, a mortar and pestle (or blender), some thin cotton fabric, and pins or needles. I chose a variety of colors in my rose petals, but it did not make much of a difference, since they are all ground together.

The petals must then be taken off of the flower, and the small, hard white cuticle cut off. It is at the base of each petal and connects it to the flower itself.

After about an hour or so of grinding. This was really intense work, but I was determined to do it the more authentic way, as opposed to using a blender. I transferred my ground petals into a teacup, for a more direct and intense grind. This worked much better.

Grinding away in the teacup. The mixture had a really nice color at this point, but that was to change quickly...See those little yellow petal chunks? They caused me some problems in this next stage. I was also sort of concerned by the smell, as it was much more leafy than rosy.

After adding water to the mixture, you must heat it in a pan over low heat (be sure not to let it boil or the scent will be destroyed). I didn't know how long or what it was supposed to look like at this point but I wasn't happy with the sort of...cat vomit look it was taking on. I had read that using a cast iron skillet would make the beads black, so I switched over to a small cast iron skillet, hoping to avoid wearing cat vomit beads around my neck.

After switching to a cast iron skillet, the mixture quickly turned an inky black. All except the little yellow pieces. They were resistant to the color-change and so I handpicked out as many pieces as I could. The smell at this point was much improved. They smelled like very fragrant warm roses, and the leafiness was gone. I didn't know how it was supposed to look when it was done, so I just called it done when I became bored of watching it cook.

The excess moisture then must be squeezed out of the mixture. The concoction is placed in a thin cotton fabric, and the water is squeezed out. Using the cast iron skillet made this so much messier, my hands are still stained black.

I then rolled out the mixture into beads and poked them with pins so they could be threaded later. They must be made twice the size as you want them, because they shrink considerably. My mixture wasn't as smooth as I had hoped, and the petals didn't stick together all that well. I hope that when they are dry I can sand and polish them. They look a little like dung rolled up by a dung beetle right now, but they smell amazing. My batch yielded 19 beads, out of about 10 or 12 roses. The recipe I went off of said that 3-4 roses would yield 24 beads. Not true.

This project was fun, messy, therapeutic, gross, and aromatic. All I must do now is wait for them to be dry in a few days and see what I can do to make them smoother. Stay tuned!