Events showcase dazzling pearls, jewelry
Jackson Sun, TN
By JACQUE HILLMAN
jhillman@jacksonsun.com
From Mary Tudor to Elizabeth Taylor, from Coco Chanel to Jacqueline Kennedy and Princess Diana, women love the glamor of lustrous pearls.
With that in mind, the West Tennessee Healthcare Foundation in Jackson will have more than $1 million dollars’ worth of museum-quality pearls and jewels at three upcoming events for women who want to cherish the enthralling mystery and elegance of pearls resting on their throats or wrists.
“Diamonds are a girl’s best friend,” said Gay Gregson of Jackson, who will attend the gala events, “but I’m a pearl girl myself.”
Gregson said she will definitely be shopping at one of these festive affairs:
The Preview Party is set for Oct. 11 at Carl and Alice Kirkland’s home featuring the jewelry designs of Margaret Ellis of Nashville. Ellis has many clients in the West Tennessee area who collect her jewelry.
At the Preview Party, the Dr. Lawrence A. Ray Endowment Award will be announced, establishing a fund for education at the foundation. Ray serves as chair and head of the Lambuth Department of Visual Art, and also as chair of the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences.
The Patrons Party, “An Evening with Jane Seymour and James Keach,” is set for Nov. 9 at Oakmont Estate and will feature the pearls of the American Pearl Company, owned by the Latendresse family.
In addition to bringing an exhibit of $500,000 in museum-quality, one-of-a-kind pearls, the company is also offering jewelry for sale and a contribution to the auction. William R. Eubanks, one of the top 50 designers in the United
States, will serve as Honorary Chairman.
“An Evening in the Imperial Palace” gala on Nov. 10 will feature
Tiffany & Co. pearls and jewels for the auction and for sale. Tiffany & Co.
has also joined the gala as a sponsor.
At the gala, the Honorable Masaru Sakato, Consul General of Japan in New
Orleans, will help honor former Ambassador to Japan Howard Baker, the
recipient of the 2007 Tigrett Award presented by WTHF.
Proceeds from both the Patron’s Party and the Charity Gala will benefit the
Ayers Children’s Medical Center at Jackson General Hospital and the Health
and Healing Clinic for the working uninsured in Jackson and Madison County.
Each of the jewelry companies interviewed said that helping raise funds for
these charitable projects was a priority in their decision to participate.
Margaret Ellis Jewelry
Interviewed in her Nashville studio, Margaret Ellis showed her designs that are so popular with her clientele. She works with South Sea and Tahitian pearls and 22-karat yellow gold, dark silver and 18-karat rose gold with cultured pearls. She also designs in bronze with tourmaline river rock and lava rock. One of her signature design methods is concave hammering.
Concave hammering “is very time-consuming and not easy to do,” Ellis said. “You don’t see a lot of it.”
A former art teacher, Ellis decided to study jewelry-making and learned under such renowned names as Heikki Seppa.
She is currently designing a menswear collection that will be all dark silver and kept in a certain price range “because a lot of women think nothing of spending several thousand dollars on jewelry, but men don’t.”
Mary Ann Stonecipher of Jackson has many pieces from the Margaret Ellis collection.
“Margaret Ellis is my favorite jewelry designer. She’s a lovely lady and extremely talented, and her pieces are unique, timeless and fine,” Stonecipher said. “I’ve been wearing Margaret’s designs since 1990. Once when traveling with my husband, he commented that he’d never been anywhere with me that I was wearing Margaret Ellis jewelry that someone didn’t stop me to admire it and to inquire about the designer.”
Ellis sells her designs in Jackson at The Boutique, owned by Tamara Sorman off Carriage House Drive.
Tiffany & Co.
While you could certainly travel to Nashville to shop at Tiffany & Co., if you come to the gala, you can meet Max Steiner, a former master jewelry designer and now director of Tiffany & Co.’s Nashville store.
A former California resident, Steiner said, “It’s really been a pleasure” coming to the South. The store in Nashville “has exceeded corporate expectations,” he added, mentioning several celebrities in the music industry who often shop at Tiffany & Co.
Coming to Jackson for the gala “is good for us,” Steiner said. “We have clients in Mississippi, Alabama, Memphis and we can meet new friends in Jackson. We even have one client in Alabama to whom we hand-deliver selections.”
Steiner said Tiffany & Co. will donate to the silent and live auction. “Pearls are a good focus, with Japan being honored at the gala,” he added. Tiffany will bring South Sea golden pearls, Tahitian pearls and black pearls “and have some diamonds in the mix.”
“We want to be approachable,” he said. “We’ve embraced the community and we want to form new partnerships,” such as working with the West Tennessee Healthcare Foundation.
American Pearl Company
The gala will honor the country of Japan, the No. 1 foreign manufacturing investor in Tennessee. So the connection between Japanese and West Tennessee pearls is natural.
West Tennessee has major economic ties to Japan. Soybeans grown in West Tennessee and the shells harvested from the Tennessee River used in the production of cultured pearls are two commodities which they highly value.
While Japan is known worldwide for its Mikimoto pearls, John Latendresse of Camden, known as the father of the American cultured pearl, founded the American Pearl Company Inc. in 1961. John Latendresse died in 2000, but today his wife, Chessy Latendresse, and their daughters, Gina and Renee, continue the legacy through the American Pearl Company in Nashville.
Anne Smith, who works with Gina Latendresse at the American Pearl Company offices in Nashville, said they plan to bring about a half-million in natural pearls to exhibit at the Patrons Party, but they will have other pearl jewelry for sale.
“The exhibit Gina and I will bring will include a $60,000 Quahog from Maine and a $75,000 Tennessee pearl. These are rare, natural pearls,” she said.
Right now the company has an exhibit traveling to Paris, France, in October worth several million dollars. The company shows pearls all over the world, but the exhibit coming to Jackson for the Patrons Party marks the first time a museum-quality pearl collection has come to West Tennessee.
The company has contributed some pearls to the Tennessee State Museum, “but not the rare ones,” Smith said.
Smith said a clasp for a pearl necklace can range from $400 to more than $3,000. A pearl bracelet can go as low as $100, so there will be something in many price ranges at the party.
Teresa Murphy of Florence, Ala., attended last year’s gala and will return this year.
“Pearls and diamonds are two of the rarest things on this earth and two of the most beautiful. Wearing a beautiful jewel that was given to me by someone I love always reminds me of that long-lasting love,” she said, adding that her husband had given her a pearl necklace, earrings and bracelet for their first anniversary.
“Today he still loves it when I wear that set with my jeans and a white shirt and jacket,” she said.
On the Net:
www.margaretellisjewelry.com
www.tiffany.com
www.americanpearl
company.com
www.pearls.com
Visit jacksonsun.com and share your thoughts.
– Jacque Hillman, 425-9679
