HOLY MOTHER OF PEARL!
Late granny’s necklace fetches $200K fortune
A WOMAN who inherited a necklace from her late grandmother-in-law went on Antiques Roadshow to get some pearls of wisdom about the jewelry — and nearly keeled over in a dead faint when she learned the oneof-a-kind design was worth $200,000, despite missing several pieces!
Show appraiser Gloria Lieberman delivered the sparkling news after inspecting the 1910s pearland-diamond collar.
“Most people would say, ‘Oh, it’s diamonds, you know, that’s what’s important,’” explains Lieberman. “No, it’s all about the pearls! This piece was probably designed by one of Tiffany’s greatest designers, Paulding Farnham, and he loved natural pearls. “Each pearl is beautiful the luster, the match, the skin on it — we call it the skin. It has no blemishes. I mean, these are beautiful, natural pearls!” She appraised the bauble at around $200,000 — even though two of its handpicked pearls had fallen off. In backing up her assessment, Lieberman pointed to two signatures on the necklace — one of the back of the diamond pendant, the other on the clasp — both pointing to acclaimed jewelry designer, sculptor and metallurgist Paulding Farnham, who headed up Tiffany’s design stable for two decades.
Farnham was “universally recognized as the genius behind Tiffany’s success” when the upscale emporium won six gold medals at the 1889 expo in Paris, according to Antique Jewelry University. The astonished owner of the necklace — who inherited it when her husband’s granny died at age 102 — says she will hold on to the family heirloom for the day when her daughter marries!