Are These Mikimoto Pearls?

Jackie from Texas mailed in these pearls for a reknot and repair.

They are absolutely gorgeous pearls, they come in a Mikimoto box and she paid very good money for them at an auction.

She was told they were Mikimotos but they don’t have the signature Mikimoto clasp . She wanted to know if I could verify! Are these authentic Mikimoto pearls?

Great question!

Mikimoto is the oldest name in cultured pearls and when Kokichi Mikimoto was alive, he was a master of marketing and self-promotion.

He also made sure customers knew their paerls were not just gorgeous pearls... they were branded in his name. This means, when you buy a strand of Mikimotos, they usually look like this:

This is a signature Mikimoto clasp. Here is the back side:

There is a signature M on the back of the clasp! telling you these are Mikimoto pearls!

Visiting the Mikimoto website, I see that alot of their newest pieces also have an M dangling from the clasp:

So, in case you are wondering, these are Mikimotos! And everyone can see it!

Now, back to Jackie's piece.... no M. No signature clasp. Are they Mikimotos?

They are beautiful, no doubt. But we work with a lot of pearls that are incredibly beautiful but are not branded Mikimoto!

However, these are in fact Mikimotos!

They do not feature the clasp we come to think of when we think of Mikimotos but Mikimoto has used different clasps over the years.

Look closely:

This an M branded clasp. Which tells me these are, in fact Mikomoto pearls!

Love,

India

Founder of ThePearlGirls.com