Hi. where is the best place to get cheap, but good quality, very crunchiable silks. Thanks !

Check out the banner for Silk King studios. They are the best place to get good, quality silks. By the way, what does crunchiable mean?

There is no such thing as cheap, good silks. Crunchiable?

Pure China or Japanese silk is highly compressible and holds up under use. Silk King makes great silks. There are others with similar products.

Richard

Sorry. Thanks Richard, that was the word I was searching for: crunchiable,bah! LOL

Greg Bordner (Abbott's) was selling some silk streamers that were remnants from the manufacture of Duke's Dye Version. These were being sold at very low prices on e-bay not long ago...he might have some left.

Thanks guys!

I know that the word before "silks" was "Cheap", but there is not very much difference in price (if ANY!) between good silks and bad silks. For the most part they are a good investment and last decades. The primary things that ruin silks are stains and punctures. Neither of those has anything to do with cost or quality of the silk. Those things are in the hands of the owners.

Good Luck!

Bob Sanders
Magic By Sander

Magic_man204:

Listen to Bob Sanders. He is a silk magician and he knows what he's talking about. You really don't want any cheap silks.

But if you want some cheap silks just to play around with, then I would suggest that you head over to Penguin Magic. They sell 9 inch silks for $1.99 and 18 inch silks for $3.99. These are cheap silks and they are not good quality silks. You are really better off to pay a just few more dollars and buy some really good silks from Rice at Silk King Studios or from Duane Laflin at Laflin Magic. You will actually save yourself money in the long run. You have to look at the overall picture when purchasing silks.

Look at silks as an investment. There's a small price difference between good and cheap silks. If you buy good silks at first then you will have them forever. The problem is that cheap silks do not last very long. They "wear out" over time but good silks will last you the rest of your life. Also cheap silks look horrible over time while good silks always look beautiful.

After you keep replacing cheap silks you will understand. You get what you pay for.

Gerard

You might be interested in some excellent quality, slightly irregular silks.
Here is the link to those available from Silk King Studios. So far, no one has been disapponted! http://www.themagiccafe.com/forums/searc......=4054248

There you go Magic_man204, head over to Silk King Studios and buy some excellent quality, slightly irregular silks. I didn't know that Silk King Studios carried irregular silks. How can you go wrong? You get to purchase high quality silks at a reduced price!!!

As with everything, you get what you pay for. However, sometimes these is an advantage to using really cheap silks, as in Eleazar Goodenough's "Every Century Silks" where he gets a spectator to sign a silk. The silks he uses are women's scarfs from the dollar store and they are just right for that effect. But the silk will be used once and given away, so you don't want to spend a lot of your hard earned money on it.

Where can you get cheap silks? Well, everywhere as they outnumber quality silks. Many professionals have had and used their quality silks for many, many years. The higher quality really is a good investment if you plan to use them for years to come.

Look! Randy has more body than he used to! (Like the avatar!)

Randy is right. Silks are an investment in your career. Sometimes they are expendable just like cards, rope, flash paper and newspaper. But your audience deserves your best.

Silks are something that can last beyond your lifetime. Punctures and stains are the killers. You should have control of that for the most part.

P&A silks are good quality and last a very long time.

True! I folded up a 24-year-old one to day. It's still in great shape.

Bob
Magic By Sander

Does anyone have an opinion on Jay Scott Berry's silks? I am ordering something else (an Eclipse Tip) from him and might add a couple silks if they're OK quality.

Thanks

Adam

There are no such thing as good cheap silks . unless you can find some for sale here on the Café.

Stevens is selling new 6' x 6' art silks (dragon, bunny, butterfly) for $120; I've seen these at Hocus Pocus also. Several dealers in quality silks sell 6' x 6' silks for around $400. What's the catch on these new ones? Are they thin, are they something other than silk?

Yours,

Paul

Paul,

These are pretty. What has happened is that silk is essentially only available in 90cm widths now. So these have a seam down the center where they are put together.

You did bring up an important consideration. As the silk importer, I find that Americans think thicker silk is more valuable than thin silk. That is very misleading. The difference in 5 momme and 8 momme silk is about $.20/square foot. Even on a 36" silk that is less than $2.00 difference. The big difference to me, is that the skill level to sew and work with 8 momme silk is much lower than for someone who sews with 5 momme silk. So they ultimately cost the same. Except for air freight being 60% more, there is basically no difference in costs. Thin won't save you money. It will greatly increase your load capacity.

As a magician, 8 momme takes 160% of the space of 5 momme silk. What that really means is that a 36" silk that is 5 momme takes about the space of a 24" silk that is 8 momme. What the audience sees is just a smaller production or vanish!

Use the thinnest silk your skill allows.

When opaqueness is required, professionally I frequently don't use silk. I do use 5 momme silks for my dove magic and have used 5 momme silks professionally on stage for decades. For Zombies, some blendos and bag tricks many fabrics will work.

Art silks are usually messages or barriers and space, color, movement flow and many of the other characteristics of silk frankly don't matter. The true benefits of real silk are usually lost in art silks anyway. The purposes are different. In art silks you are buying the picture.

Bob Sanders
Magic By Sander

Fun Inc. or Royal Magic has gotten into the silk business. They are fantastic silk screening but the silk is like 3mm. These are an exact copy of the famous Rice silk line. The problem with such a thin silk is it will 'snag' look bad in a very short time. These are the silks Stevens Magic are selling.

http://www.funinc.com/xcart/customer/sea......ng=silks