Pen Shell Heishi Bracelet BBB70

What is Pen Shell?

Pen shell, also called sea wing and fan mussel, shares characteristics with oysters, scallops, and mussels. Having the general shape of a mussel with two thin-walled, fan-shaped shells, the pen shell is typically long and tapered, somewhat triangular, like a flag or pennant from which it get its name. Pen shells can grow to more that twelve inches in length. The shells are various shades of black and reddish brown with colorful iridescent lining. Pen shells are common in shallow waters near seagrass beds and are usually found buried in the sand with only the upper portion of the shell exposed. Pen shell heishi is commonly used by Native American artists either by itself or as spacers with other materials such as turquoise, coral and spiny oyster.

What is the Bargain Barn?

Our Bargain Barn is a mixed bag of new and used items. They might come from inheritances, estate sales, private collections, and store liquidations. We'll give you as much information as we can, but often the materials, date and origin are unknown.
Bargain Barn items are sold as described and are not returnable.

For vintage items visit our Vintage Shop.

For new items visit our New Jewelry Store.

Our Rescue Mission
of Native American Indian Jewerly and Artifacts

We are in the vintage Native American jewelry rescue business and are passionate about finding new homes for used and vintage jewelry and artifacts. That's why we purchase Native American pieces from estates, inheritances, collection downsizing and New Old Stock (NOS) inventory from closed stores.

Often people contact us after taking a box of Native American jewelry to their local pawn shop and find that a pawn shop is mainly interested in melt value of the metals and not in preserving the beautiful historic pieces. To hear that people have considered selling these treasures for melt value makes us truly sad.

Melt value is usually far below what we would offer for the jewelry. Yet we can't pay retail price for items because of the time and cost involved in finding new homes for them. We have to research, often repair and restore the jewelry, photograph and list each item on our website, and sometimes hold pieces in inventory for years until the right buyer comes along.

Items that are not Native American made or that we cannot verify as such go into our Bargain Barn where you can find some real treasures at low prices.

We hope you'll find something special in our vintage shop that will complete yet another circle of our jewelry re-homing mission.

Pen Shell Heishi Bracelet
HK Item #BBB70 - size 7 1/2

What is Pen Shell?

What is the Bargain Barn?

Our Rescue Mission
of Native American Indian Jewerly and Artifacts

Pen Shell Heishi BraceletHK Item #BBB70 - size 7 1/2

What is Pen Shell?

What is the Bargain Barn?

Our Rescue Missionof Native American Indian Jewerly and Artifacts

Pen Shell Heishi Bracelet
HK Item #BBB70 - size 7 1/2

Our Rescue Mission
of Native American Indian Jewerly and Artifacts