The Mikimoto Story Creation of An Industry

It is a fallacy that Kokichi Mikimoto was the first person to culture a pearl. The Chinese were already doing it for centuries. In fact, he learnt of inducing oysters to produce pearls from someone else. What is true though, is that he is the first person to successfully induce the growth of a fully round pearl or what we now know of as Akoya. It happened like this. During a visit to the National Exhibit for the Promotion of Industry, Kokichi Mikimoto (born 1858), saw how objects could be inserted into Akoya and other pearl oysters to create cultured pearls.

At the time when he visited the exhibit, he had already developed an interest in the idea of culturing pearls, therefore while he was there he took the opportunity to meet a professor from the Imperial University. The same year, he started studying the cultivation of pearls and after four years of intensive study, he was able to successfully grow and produce cultured pearls from a protuberance inside the shell of the oyster. For this, he obtained his first patent (Patent No. 2670). The semicircular pearls he produced were slightly different from common pearls but they were well received and widely used as decorative objects. However, Kokichi was not satisfied. He wanted more. He wanted fully round pearls and thus he continued with experiments aimed at creating the fully round pearls for which the Mikimoto company is so justly famous today. However, let us go back to the start when it all began.
		Kokichi Mikimoto, Father of the Cultured Pearl Industry

In the mid 1800's, Japan had shed centuries of isolation and become deeply involved in foreign trade. Japan's marine treasures, the beautiful natural pearls that were so valued by the Japanese were also regarded as most precious in the international market which coveted them intensely. Consequently as often happens with fragile natural resources that take a long time to replenish, the pearls were being over harvested and the situation had reached a crisis point.

For Kokichi who loved pearls, the fear of their depletion and the extinction of the oysters that produced them was the right catalyst to spur him to try and cultivate them and thus gave birth to the multi million dollar cultured pearl industry. Kokichi threw himself and all his resources into experimenting with the creation of cultured pearls. Success did not come immediately, in fact as with all trial and error processes, there were more failures than triumphs and more discouraging moments than exhilarating ones but the ultimate prize was worth all the tribulations and so he persevered.

The first cultured semi-spherical pearl for which Kokichi Mikimoto got patent no. 2670

For decades, he spent every waking moment on seeding oysters, researching and experimenting. Adding to his worries were the impediments imposed by nature herself. Factors such as the mysterious red tides and low water temperatures led to repeated failures. A lesser man would certainly have given up in the face of all these natural complications which are beyond the power of human intervention. Kokichi Mikimoto was a stubborn man however and not one to give up regardless of the factors against him. His determination paid off finally and the day he had been waiting for came on July 11, 1893. Accompanied by his wife Ume, he raised a bamboo oyster basket out of the water, opened one of the oysters and there inside the shell nestled a shining pearl.

1-2 Kokichi Mikimoto pours low quality cultured pearls into a bonfire in front of the Kobe Chamber of Commerce in 1932.
3-4 Mikimoto opened a pearl farm on the South Pacific island of Palau in 1922.
5. Kokichi Mikimoto, founder of the Mikimoto, empire.

Once, he had tasted success, he did not intend to stop. He built upon the method that had been discovered independently by him and two others, also in Japan. However, they had already taken out a patent on the process, which they had named after themselves, the Mise-Nishikawa method. So Kokichi had to go back to the drawing board. He realised that their method produced what we know of as Mabe pearls, so now he worked on a method to produce round pearls. He succeeded in that in 1905. His success allowed him the means to buy the rights to the earlier patent.

Once he had become proficient at culturing perfectly spherical pearls, Kokichi turned his attention to the beauty of the black-lipped pearl and the silver-lipped pearl. In 1914, he opened a culturing site for black lipped pearl oysters on Ishigaki island in Okinawa. As usual the forces of nature, especially the frequent typhoons, proved to be daunting obstacles but nevertheless Kokichi proved successful in culturing a 10mm pearl in 1931. He dispatched a team of researchers to the South Pacific island of Palau, where they had considerable success in culturing pearls. While trying to meet the challenge of producing black-lipped and silver-lipped pearls, he simultaneously encouraged the development of local pearl industries on these hitherto underdeveloped islands where even today the name Mikimoto is uttered with reverence.

Shortly after he had succeeded in culturing a perfectly round pearl, Kokichi Mikimoto declared "I would like to adorn the necks of all the women in the world with pearls." He had already taken the first step down this path with the opening of the first Mikimoto pearl store in Tokyo's Ginza area in 1899. It was the world's first store specialising entirely in pearl jewellery. The concept worked and in 1906 he moved the store to a new building in Ginza 4-chome. The Mikimoto Pearl Store housed in a two storey western type building made of white stone was very modern and westernised for its time. Inside young men dressed in high collared three piece suits waited on the customers. The jewellery was made after the contemporary fashion and each month the store featured new displays conceived by expert designers.

1. Princess Grace Collection launched in 2002
2. 1969 -Mikimoto wins De Beers Diamonds International Awards for the fist time with this brooch "Prelude to Space"

Kokichi spared no effort to keep abreast of the latest knowledge of fashion and design from around the world so that Mikimoto jewellery always stayed on the contemporary edge. He sent his best employees abroad to learn about the latest designs and Grafting technology and incorporate these ideas into the working of his own company. He was certain that if he mastered selection of materials and design, engraving technology and other specialities of jewellery making, he would be able to create jewels that the whole world could appreciate and cherish. Thus he set up the Mikimoto Gold Work Factory in Tokyo's Tsukiji area in 1907. He hired a specialised team of craftsmen and invited jewellery designers to come and work exclusively for the Ginza store.

  1 In every fine jewellery centre,
     there is a Mikimoto showroom
     that offers customers the finest      pearls guaranteed by the      Mikimoto name.

The result of all this work was that the Mikimoto Pearl Store became well established and its fame spread beyond the borders of Japan to span the whole world. This led to the opening of a Mikimoto store in London in 1913, followed in quick succession by stores in Paris, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Shanghai and Bombay.

    1 Model of George Washington's residence exhibited at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933.

    2 Five storied pearl pagoda displayed at the Philadelphia World's Fair 1926.

   3 The Miss Universe Crown donated by Mikimoto.

   4 Mikimoto Liberty Bell displayed at the New New York World's Fair in 1939.

Apart from pearls, there was one other thing that Kokichi had mastered and that was public relations and publicity. He therefore grabbed every opportunity to display his creations. Beginning with the World Exposition in Philadelphia in 1926, he went on to exhibit at expositions in cities such as Chicago, New York and Paris. While he was there, he did not only display jewellery but also made sure that his booth held a major conversation piece that would prove to be a magnet and attract all the visitors to come and take a look. Therefore, in the 1926 Philadelphia exposition he displayed a five storied pearl pagoda. In 1933, it was a model of George Washington's residence at the Chicago World's Fair. At the New York World's Fair in 1939, he displayed the Mikimoto Liberty Bell.

		1 Mikimoto Pearl Island. 2 Oyster Cages.

In fact, due to the efforts of Kokichi Mikimoto and his company, in the 1930's the popularity of pearls had gone up worldwide and with it there was an accompanying expansion of the cultured pearl industry and thus a new industry took root in Japan. However, most of the pearl farms were unable to maintain quality standards and crude, inferior pearls began to appear on the market. In a brilliant piece of well staged publicity, Kokichi went to the plaza in front of the Kobe Chamber of Commerce (the office that had most to do with foreign trade at the time) and threw a succession of low quality pearls in to a blazing bonfire. It was his way of drawing society's attention to the importance of quality. Responding to insistent demands from both Japan and abroad to maintain the quality of cultured pearls, Kokichi founded the Japan Pearl Producers Association.

Kokichi Mikimoto passed away in 1954 at the age of 96 but the legend that he built endures. Today the name Mikimoto is emblematic of the cultured pearl both in Japan and throughout the world. The foundation that was built on quality ensures that customers around the globe can confidently buy their pearls from Mikimoto as the name itself is the guarantee that these pearls are the best to be found.