[perlas]

Yesterday I saw some 2mm small akoyas. I thought they were Akoya seed pearls of pure nacre but upon closer inspection, I saw one with chipped of nacre and a bead was exposed! Imagine this in 2mm pearls!

The tiny pearls were also pinked. Mostly are round to off-round.

Anyone ever seen such small beaded akoyas? The seller informed this was from an old stock during 1990s.

[Zeide Erskine]

Hi Sam,

Yes I have seen these before. They are probably the world's greatest waste of money and were grown in Korea and China on commission for Japanese factories. Up until the early 1970s such small pearls that typically found their use in end pearls of graduated strands and accents in rings and brooches were typically keshis without nucleus. However when culturing times went down drastically, the keshis were too small to use for that and the factories commissioned the lowest-wage countries available to nucleate micropearls.

Zeide

[Slraep]

Hi Perlas,

Yes, I unfortunately have some very small akoya that I thought were
all nacre also. It's mind boggling. Mine have all the nacre worn off except for tiny bits here and there. I use them for show and tell; show them the crappy pearls and tell them not to buy.

I've hated akoyas since childhood. South seas still have some appeal to me but I'm trying hard to ferret out better quality and thickest plating, for myself, anyway.

And I just quite recently realised, just how lovely, good quality freshwaters could be.

Slraep

[purepearls]

Apparently, these very small Akoya pearls are very popular in Japan.

I see this size in Freshwaters in American designer jewelry everywhere right now. I love Elizabeth Showers' jewelry and she has used this size Freshwater in some of her pieces. She has some amazing pieces!http://www.elizabethshowersvintage.com/