Tiny 5 mm to 7 mm Tahitians—Did You Know They Exist?

Hong Kong. March 1, 2019. In 2015, CPAA member Alexander Collins, of the eponymous loose Tahitian pearl company based in the Takaroa atoll in French Polynesia, experienced a problem to which only Tahitian pearl farmers could relate: he ran out of mature oysters to graft. It’s a real (sad) phenomenon, because pearl farmers in Tahiti by and large do not have hatcheries—a consistent supply of oysters—to grow and use; Tahitian farmers primarily obtain oysters from the wild.

Tiny 7, 6, and 5 mm Tahitian pearls grown by Alexander Collins out of Tahiti.

Collins’ choice? Either stop grafting for three months (until age-appropriate or 9- to 10-centimeter oysters could be found) or do something that few Tahitian pearl farmers had ever done: graft smaller Tahitian pearls. This idea required not just smaller nuclei—from 1.6 bu (a reference to weight) to 2.1 bu versus the typical 2.2 bu to 2.5 bu—but also smaller knives and pincers (used to prop open oysters during nucleation), among other tools. His biggest priority? Keeping his staff, including two Chinese grafters skilled in seeding smaller akoya pearl nuclei, employed in the remote Tuamotu Archipelago.

Armed with those specialized staffers, Collins decided to give tiny pearls a try, seeding 20,000 oysters and leaving them in the water for 17 to 21 months. At harvest, he had 10,000 commercially viable pearls. The next hurdle? To pass X-ray control by the Tahitian government to ensure a standard minimum thickness of 0.8 mm. (This practice is no longer in effect.) Out of all the

pearls scanned, just seven were plucked from parcels for failure to adhere to the thickness regulation. The next stop for his tiny treasures? A jewelry trade show in Hong Kong.

Tiny 7, 6, and 5 mm Tahitian pearls grown by Alexander Collins out of Tahiti.

“Japanese buyers went nuts because they were used to small akoyas,” recollects Collins. A number of buyers low-balled on price and tried to buy him out, but he resisted so as not to devalue the specialness of the crop, which ranged in size from 5 mm to 7 mm a pearl. Typical Tahitian pearls grow in sizes ranging from 8 mm to more than 18 mm.

Now, a few years later, others have attempted to copy his efforts, but some don’t graft small enough beads, thereby creating thin nacre coatings. Plus, the colors belonging to others are oftentimes dull. Collins still offers some normal-size Tahitians, but he’s making tiny his signature. “We became a niche by necessity,” he explains from the current Hong Kong Trade Development Council International Diamond, Gem & Pearl Show taking place from Feb. 25 to March 2.

Thus far, his little pearls are a hit. One European client was seen sprinting to his booth to shop on opening day, and nearly all of his 6 mm numbers had sold by the show’s close. Pairs, hanks, and finished strands are available from $120 triple keystone to $450 to $5,400.

Collins’ price structure has evolved to mimic that of the high-end tiny Japanese akoya pearls—the smaller (and thus rarer) they are, the higher the price.

“Just as some companies have a monopoly on small sizes of akoyas, I want to be known for that in Tahitians,” adds Collins.

Reach Collins at adcdcs@yahoo.com. 

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