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I have some hand bead costumes that are 20 years old and the fringe is still in fantastic shape. My costumes were made with bugle beads and beaded with a lightweight nylon fishing line. I can't remember the poundage. 9lbs comes to mind but it might be less than that. You don't want too heavy a weight otherwise the beads will hang stiflly. Looping helps. Also double threading also helps. Bugle beads however can be hard to double thread. My costume maker would tie off each length of bugle bead fringe with a small seed or rocaille bead and knot the thread by going through the seed bead several times then up through as many strands of bugle beads as possible. If the fringe was short this was easy but I had some costumes were the fringe reached the floor, not so easy to go all the way back up!
Many dancers I knew would also seal the bottom with clear nail polish.
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Norma -Raks Sharqi
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