I recently went to a bead show and stumbled across something I’ve never seen in my 15 years in the jewelry industry: meticulously-crafted LED lights designed to be inserted into beads, with an ingenious magnetic clasp that doubles as a rechargeable battery pack. I was absolutely enchanted, and despite the relatively steep cost of the product and having already spent my entire budget for the day, I ended up pulling out the business credit card and buying a kit. 

And at the next booth, while rummaging through a bin of beads with holes big enough to accommodate the LED... I found a piece of amber. With an insect fossilized inside it. (I think it might be a bee? But I’m not an expert, I’ve never actually run across amber with a fossil in it before.) I might possibly have squeaked in a most undignified manner.

The LEDs and battery packs are made by here in NH; the battery pack in this necklace is their white bronze, which is a slightly warm-toned silver. The battery pack is powered by a small solar cell; to recharge it, just place the clasp in a sunny window for a few hours. It will glow for up to 6 hours when fully charged. 

Because I love the concept and want to see it succeed, and because this necklace is essentially a prototype for me, I am NOT marking up the LED and battery pack components - this necklace without the LED would normally be about $85. Most of the additional cost is for the battery pack, which is interchangeable with any other necklace using their LED system - if I begin make these necklaces on a regular basis (and I really hope I will!) I will sell the battery packs separately so you only have to buy that part once.

I temporarily attached the clasp at the maximum possible length so I can show the necklace both lit and unlit; I can adjust it to any length between 12 and 24 inches. The necklace can be worn both with and without the battery pack, which is about an inch long, so the absolute maximum length it can be is 25 inches.

PLEASE NOTE: once I adjust the length, I will NOT be able to make it longer! Unlike my regular necklaces which can always have an extender added, this necklace has a conductive wire running from the LED to the battery pack, creating a circuit, and once I cut that wire to length, I can not make it longer again, only shorter. Please please PLEASE double- and triple-check your measurement, and if you aren’t sure what length you need, please talk to me and I’ll help you figure it out. Err on the longer side of caution - if you get the necklace and it’s too long, there are multiple ways to fix that, including sending it back to me to be shortened, but not the other way around. 

International folks - the manufacturer does not ship their products outside the US, and I haven’t had a chance to check regulations about mailing batteries internationally, so I’m going to regretfully call this a US-only product for the moment. If you live outside the US and really love it, let me know and I’ll try to find out if I can legally send it to you and how much that would cost.