Wooly mammoth ivory 'jewery' is everywhere.
Luxury retailer Stanley Korshak in Dallas, Texas can't keep it in stock. Michelle Obama has been photographed numerous times wearing it. For CFDA design darling Monique P`ean and Ivory Jacks in Bothel, Washington, that create the material, business has been good.
The Fist Lady wore woolly mammoth jewery by Monique P`ean on a trip to Mexico a few months ago - specifically earrings , cuffs and strangs. She wore the cuffs again recently to greet President Obama on his 49th birthday. The cuffs go for $4,480 to $7,420 at http://www.twistonline.com/. The earrings can fetch between $915 and $2,970 at http://www.barneys.com/.
Unlike elephant ivory which is primarily off-white, woolly mammoth ivory is unique in that it has many different colors tans, brown and sometime blue. Ivory Jacks jewelry designer Courtney Tripp explained this week at the Gift Show in New york that the colors are a result of thousands of years of mineralization. No two tusks are the same color. So no two mammoth jewery pieces can be exactly the same.
The ban on ivory-implemented since the 80's to stop poachers from killing the elephants simply for their tusks does not apply to this fossilized stuff. Trade in dead mammoth ivory is legal and has been for 300 years because of mammoths found in the permafrost of Arctic regions in Siberia, North canada or Alaska. As the ice packs and glaciers have receded, more and more tusks have been found. Tusks have been unearthed in road contruction or spotted from a plane in melting river banks.
Most jewelers claim that woolly mammoth jewelry is conflict free, eco friendly and sustainable . The truth is mammoth ivory is rare and costly because mammoths have been extinct for millennia. The AFP reports Hong Kong customs cleared 21 tons of mammoth ivory and more than 90 percent of it came from Russia's arctic tundra. Most of it is from 10,000 to 40,000 years old. While it's hard to say how soon the worlds stockpile of fossilized ivory could disappear, Fisher says it probably won't be any sooner than about 10 years from now..
My spin : Wonder if the First lady would give a donation to the Polar Bears. It's a worthy cause to save the endangered species and solve the problem of Climate Change. Perhaps we'll ask her...it's worth a try...stay tuned;
Unlike elephant ivory which is primarily off-white, woolly mammoth ivory is unique in that it has many different colors tans, brown and sometime blue. Ivory Jacks jewelry designer Courtney Tripp explained this week at the Gift Show in New york that the colors are a result of thousands of years of mineralization. No two tusks are the same color. So no two mammoth jewery pieces can be exactly the same.
The ban on ivory-implemented since the 80's to stop poachers from killing the elephants simply for their tusks does not apply to this fossilized stuff. Trade in dead mammoth ivory is legal and has been for 300 years because of mammoths found in the permafrost of Arctic regions in Siberia, North canada or Alaska. As the ice packs and glaciers have receded, more and more tusks have been found. Tusks have been unearthed in road contruction or spotted from a plane in melting river banks.
Most jewelers claim that woolly mammoth jewelry is conflict free, eco friendly and sustainable . The truth is mammoth ivory is rare and costly because mammoths have been extinct for millennia. The AFP reports Hong Kong customs cleared 21 tons of mammoth ivory and more than 90 percent of it came from Russia's arctic tundra. Most of it is from 10,000 to 40,000 years old. While it's hard to say how soon the worlds stockpile of fossilized ivory could disappear, Fisher says it probably won't be any sooner than about 10 years from now..
My spin : Wonder if the First lady would give a donation to the Polar Bears. It's a worthy cause to save the endangered species and solve the problem of Climate Change. Perhaps we'll ask her...it's worth a try...stay tuned;
I am surprised that she would wear such a thing. She sets the precedents that women follow worldwide.We should preserve those tusks for posterity.
ReplyDeleteI am not surprised to see her wear the ivory...she is a wannbe celebrity seeker...
ReplyDeleteWe have followed all the first ladies in their styles.
Did you notice the blue dress makes her look 5/6 months pregnant...I'm just saying, but hey that's just me.