How to Color Wood Beads
See our guide here to coloring wood beads by several different methods, including paint, pens, and dye. Create beautiful crafts with colored beads!
Wood beads are a fantastic craft supply. You can make a lot of useful and unique items for you and your home with wood beads.
Wood beads are also really inexpensive to purchase and so easy to use too. They are quite honestly the perfect craft supply.
There are so many things that you can make with wood beads, including this wood bead towel holder, wood bead trivets, and wood bead Christmas ornaments.
Why Color Wood Beads?
Wood beads come in a natural wood color. You can purchase some pre-colored wood beads, but especially if you want a certain color you will need to color them yourself.
By coloring wood beads you can create more unique and different projects.
For instance, you could create rainbow colored wreaths and strands with wood beads, create colored jewelry with wood beads, and also things such as trivets and more.
There are several different ways to color wood beads, including painting, dyeing, and using felt and brush pens.
Here I am covering the most common ways to color wood beads. Select the method that works best for you!
Supplies Needed to Color Wood Beads
Note: The actual supplies that you will need depend on the method of coloring beads that you will use – detailed below. So please purchase supplies according to your method of choice
Pack of Assorted Sizes of Wood Beads
Set of Assorted Sized Paintbrushes
How to Dye Wood Beads
To dye wood beads you will need to use either liquid dye or liquid food coloring.
1. Taking a glass jar, put drops of the dye or food coloring inside and add the wood beads. Add some water and swirl and mix the beads around in the mixture to take on the color that you placed inside.
2. If you plan on coloring a lot of wood beads at one time, choose a larger glass jar. Try to make sure the jar has a wide mouth so that you an easily get the beads in and out of the jar, and you will also need a lid.
3. As mentioned above you should add a few drops of the color you are using, together with a few drops of water to dilute the dye/coloring.
4. You could mix several colors together to get different colors. If you want more vibrant colors use less water. If you want more watered down colors use more water.
5. Once you have your colors, water and beads placed in the jar, place the lid on the top of the jar and gently shake it, ensuring that the beads are covered in the coloring mixture.
6. Pour out the beads and color mixture into a bowl, or turn the jar on its side.
7. Taking a toothpick, remove each colored bead separately, and place on wax paper to dry.
8. If you will be using lots of different colors to dye your beads, make sure that you rinse out the jar between colors.
9. Once the wood beads are completely dry, you can spray them with a varnish that will seal and protect them. Colored beads will bleed color when they are wet unless you take this final step.
Related: 11 Wood Bead Necklace DIY Projects
How to Paint Wood Beads
Direct Painting Method
You can paint wood beads using paint. The best paint to use is acrylic paint, as it covers the wood so much better than other paint types.
One of the best ways to paint wood beads is by using a long toothpick. Using this method you would place the bead or beads on the toothpick. You then paint the beads using the paint of your choice on all sides.
Once the beads are completely painted, place them on a piece of wax paper to dry. To make sure the painted bead doesn’t stick to the paper, keep rolling it around on the paper, to ensure that it dries on all sides.
Painting in a Bowl
You can also paint wood beads in a bowl. To do this just place the beads and paint together in the bowl.
Using a toothpick or paintbrush, roll the beads around in the paint until they are completely covered.
Carefully remove the paint covered beads from the bowl and place on wax paper to dry.
Painting with Paint Pens
Paint pens are a great way to paint wood beads. They are easy to use and the beads also dry faster with this method.
Place the bead on a toothpick, and using the paint pen of your choice, color in the wood bead.
You can use fine tip felt pens, brush pens and more for this method.
Should you Finish your Colored Beads with Varnish?
Colored beads will bleed if exposed to damp or water, no matter what painting method you used to color them.
Therefore it is always recommended to finish off the beads by spraying them with a varnish.
This will lock in and seal the color on the wood bead, give it a lovely finish, and ensure that whatever you made with the beads will take wear and tear and still work for you!
See our guide here to coloring wood beads with different methods, including paint, pens, and dye. Create beautiful crafts with these colored beads!