| Hi Zeide,
The freshwater Keshi I have are very different looking than the Baroques that I have even the flat baroques don't look like a keshi pearl. There must be something in the growth process that makes for very different pearls?
When I wanted to start using pearls again in my work I had memories of big fat " Lake Biwa" pearls I used to buy. Then I found out that "Biwa " pearls seemed to now be synonymous with "stick" pearls and that what I wanted are now "keshi" pearls. However Keshi is being used to describe a lot of different looking freshwater pearls, particularly the very thin ones. I presume that these are so thin because they have not been allowed to grow fatter before harvest?
After a lot of research to try and figure out what was what I finally purchased what were sold as "reborn" pearls, another term the Chinese are using for Keshi and are pretty much like the high end pearls I used to buy from "Lake Biwa". I think that what I would call the wild west nature of current freshwater pearl marketing leads to a lot of potential for confusion and misunderstanding.
Doug  |