Elegant Akoya Pearl Earrings with Thick Nacre and K14 Gold

These are Akoya pearl earrings.
Recently, I acquired a baby pearl necklace, and with that, I first made a bracelet.
Next, I created these earrings with the same design.
Originally, I wanted to use string and make them all-knotted, but after many trials and errors, I gave up on that idea.

You can see this earrings here.

It’s hard to describe the color of these pearls in words. Due to the thick nacre, they have a sense of density.
Sometimes they look silver, and at other times they appear slightly gold or cream-colored.
Currently, in the room where I have the lights on, they look somewhere between white and silver.
The overall impression is quite subdued.
They are not flashy. If I were to assign them an age, they would be for those in their 40s or older.
They seem uninterested in trends.
These pearls remind me of someone reading an old book quietly, with the TV and radio turned off.
Yet, they are quite beautiful.
They don’t express much emotion and always have a calm demeanor.
They don’t readily offer words of comfort to a friend in distress.
Instead, they just stay by their side, quietly accepting everything.
They slowly close their eyes, gently nodding, and seem to understand their friend’s heart.

These pearls were harvested last year, but they have a somewhat vintage, elegant feel.
Recent pearls often have a thin nacre layer, but because these pearls have a very thick nacre, I feel this way about them.

By the way, I took these photos at my home.
From the balcony of my home, you can see the city of Kobe.
Some people say, “It looks like a very nice place. The rent must be high.”

In reality, it’s the opposite. Indeed, the view is fantastic. However, this apartment is at the top of a very steep hill.
Therefore, the rent is quite cheap.
It’s significantly cheaper than the market rate, but in return, the rooms are spacious (by Japanese standards), and the view is excellent.

From this home, you can see the center of Kobe, and just the other day, I went to that part of the city to meet with a pearl dealer.
On my way back, as I was getting on my motorcycle, I first encountered two pearl dealers walking towards me.
While chatting with them, another pearl dealer noticed me and approached.
I hadn’t contacted him since I left my previous pearl company.
While talking with him, I learned that the processing of pearls harvested last year had just been completed.
I plan to visit his company soon to see the new products.
There are many pearl farms in Japan.
Among them, there are some with very high technical skills.
The name of one such farm isn’t often mentioned in the industry, but it’s famous.
The reason is the thickness and density of their nacre.
Usually, pearl farms insert one nucleus into each Akoya oyster, but this farm inserts two nuclei.
The pearls from Akoya oysters with two nuclei tend to have very thick nacre.
However, without proper technique, the oysters may expel the nuclei, or the quality of the pearls may drop.
Especially in recent years, with the mass die-off of Akoya oysters reducing their numbers, more farms are adopting the two-nucleus method, but without proper technique inheritance, it doesn’t always go as planned.

Incidentally, the pearls that the dealer mentioned the other day, which had finished processing, are from that famous farm.
He just sent me photos, and they were necklaces with a deep natural blue color.
I am very excited to see them in person.
However, at last year’s auction for the harvested pearls, where I participated as a seller, the prices had risen astonishingly high.
That is the issue.

Today is June 9, 2024. It seems to be rainy. The rainy season might be starting in Japan soon.

This product description is a direct quote from what I wrote on Etsy.com.