Transforming family pearls into contemporary jewelry for everyday use

My family had no pearl necklaces passed down from generation to generation. There was just a Japanese grandmother who loved, above all, the sea. She tried, by all means, to bring it along while crossing the Planet to live in Brazil. In the middle of the land, in São Paulo, there was no sea, and there was not even fresh fish to make sushi! The family had to resort to chicken, cut into strips and fried, but that’s another story.

I want to talk about my passion for pearls and my paternal grandmother, whom I knew so little. She collected crates and crates of seashells (how could she bring all that by boat from Japan in the 1920s?).

From my childhood memory, I saw her shells next to the outdoor sink, where she did the laundry by hand. They were not always visible; it was her secret. It was the memories of a sweet lady so devoted to her family who left her native country to settle in Brazil in the process of becoming full of promises of abundance that were not accessible in this Northern Japan, recently emerging from the Middle Ages. She had to endure many emotional worries without being able to show them, busy as she was taking care of her six children, her husband, and her parents-in-law.

I don’t know if this is the origin of my passion for pearls and the treasures of the sea in general: corals of all colors, shells, even broken or worn by the elements, the sand, the blue, the water.

Or would it come from the perfection, the entirety of this round or rounded shape, perfect even when it is imperfect in our eyes as human beings?

Pearls are, in my opinion, the purest and the most poetic form that nature has given us. They are a bit like us humans, all the same, but all different. They exist in a whole range of colors, more or less iridescent and more or less defined. The pearls are, at the same time, very well-defined by their round contours and, at the same time, very subtle by the finish of their surfaces. They are magical!

Very early in the History of Humanity, pearls were used as ornaments, currency, and symbols expressing the power and wealth of certain characters, mainly male ones.

How fortunate for us women from today, this very recent inversion of History allows us to use them almost as a feminine exclusivity.

From my point of view, pearls are the very attribute of femininity, based on the power of rounded shapes and on the pearls that give depth and complexity to seemingly closed conditions.

In 2020 I compensated for the lack of these pearl necklaces that I did not inherit from my family. Let’s be light; let’s be happy! Different compositions are available by designing and making the «Y» transformable necklace from its set with two bracelets and a ring.

This necklace, whose model has been registered, can be used in a daily version, in an « Opéra » version, and an « Apéritif » version, accordingly to our desires.

I imagined it both as an ensemble and as a heritage object to be transmitted, designed in a timeless configuration to be able to cross the generations. Having no family pearls, I made it with pearls that I bought.

I propose transforming your family pearls into contemporary jewelry for daily use.

The «Y» transformable necklace is just a ‘proof of concept’ of what can be done with pearls. An exclusive model can be created especially for you, considering your personality and the History of your family pearls.

It will then be crafted in Paris by me, with the help of all the French luxury industry sector, available here.

Ingrid de Rio Campo