|
  |
|
|
Primer Pearls
Cultured Pearl Beauty Primer Knowing and caring for your pearls Caring For Your Cultured Pearls
With a little care and attention, your cultured pearls will retain their luster and beauty for generations to come. Perfumes and cosmetics contain chemicals that can dull the luster of a pearl over time. To avoid this, put your pearl jewelry on after applying makeup, perfume, and hair spray. Wipe your pearls with a soft damp cloth after removing them to ensure they remain clean and free of damage. Pearl nacre is relatively soft compared to other gemstones and precious metals. Your pearls should always be stored separately, perhaps in a soft cloth pouch or a lined section of your jewelry box. Bring your pearls to us for a thorough cleaning and restringing every year or two (more frequently if worn often). We will gently clean and restring your pearls by hand onto fresh silk, restoring your pearls to a like-new beauty. Enhancement In Cultured Pearls: What you should know
Since ancient times, pearls have been washed and artificially colored to create more beautiful adornments. Today, freshwater and saltwater cultured pearls are often bleached to achieve a uniform, more desirable hue. They also may be gently polished to improve their roundness and luster. Naturally fancy-colored cultured pearls are rare. Many pearls, particularly from freshwaters, are dyed and otherwise treated. These treatments are all permanent and require no special care by the wearer. The Birth of a Pearl
A pearl forms when an irritant is trapped within the body of a mollusk. Jus as one’s eye produces tears to wash away a speck of dust, the mollusk produces a material to isolate the irritant. As time passes, this coating, called nacre, is deposited layer upon layer, enveloping the invading particle, and ultimately forms a pearl. Cultured Pearls – a Twentieth Century Miracle
Historically, natural pearls were extremely rare. Today, sadly, pollution and over-harvesting have made them virtually extinct. However, because pearls have always been coveted, attempts have long been made to increase production. Finally, around the turn of the century, the process of “culturing” was perfected. Cultured pearls share the same properties as natural pearls. They are also grown within live mollusks; however, in a cultured pearl, the initial irritant is inserted by man, then nature completes the process. During the culturing process, the mollusk may stay in the water for up to three or more years. Over the course of this growing time, it is carefully cleaned, checked and cared for. At harvesting time, less than 30% of the implanted mollusks will produce useable pearls. Very few of these will be truly beautiful and desirable. So, even with the modern culturing process, the production of a gem-quality pearl is a rare and lucky occurrence.
Quality and Value in Cultured Pearls
There is no universally recognized standard for grading cultured pearls, both because it is impossible to create a master comparison set, and because pearls come in an infinite variety of qualities. The criteria described below are most often used to judge pearls. We can help you weigh the factors you consider most important, so that the pearls you select are the best value for you. Size
A pearl is measured in millimeters, typically perpendicular to its drill hole. Because no pearl is perfectly round, the measurement generally reflects a range, such as 7x6.5 mm in size. Because it is more difficult for a mollusk to successfully accept larger irritants, larger pearls are rarer and more costly. Necklaces composed of very tiny pearls can also be highly valued because the oyster generally produces only one pearl and each tiny pearl must be hand-drilled and matched meticulously to the next. Coating and Surface
The quality and thickness of the nacre coating is probably the single most important factor in determining the value and longevity of a pearl. Pearls are thick, healthy coatings of nacre will wear best, resist chipping or peeling, and retain their beauty over time. As with all organic materials, pearls become creamier in color as they age and interact with the air around them; however, a thickly-coated pearl will best maintain the purity of its color. A well-coated pearl has even color, no striping or banding, and reflects light evenly in all directions. The surface of the pearl should be free of heavy pits and chips, though small “beauty markds” are subtle reminders of nature’s hand. Luster
Luster is the visual reflection of light from the pearl surface back to the observer’s eye. Although a thick healthy nacre tends to produce a more lustrous pearl, this is not always the case. Pearls cultivated in the warmer waters of the South Seas have the thickest coatings of all pearls, and yet often have a silky, rather than shiny, luster. Shape
Perfectly round pearls are the rarest and hardest to find, and therefore the most valuable. Off-round and baroque pearls, with their unique free-form shapes, can be very lustrous and beautiful, yet they are much less costly due to their more common occurrence. Value need not dictate personal preference. Any shape pearl can be very beautiful. Color
Cultured pearls come in a variety of colors, from shimmering silvery-white to deep midnight-black. There is no single “best” color, though some are more rare than others. Matching
The artistry and value of a truly fine cultured pearl piece lies in the painstaking hand-matching of pearls to each other. Except in the case of a graduated pearl necklace, the pearls used traditionally should be of similar size, shape and color.
|
Contributor's Note
For more information on pearls or other jewelry components, contact Kim Paluch at kim@of-the-earth.org.
|
|
No reactions yet.
Please login or sign up to rate this intel.
Please login or sign up to add a comment.
The copyright for this content entitled "Primer Pearls" has been specified by the contributor as:
All Rights Reserved
This content may not be copied, distributed or adapted by anyone under any circumstances.
|
 |
May, 2012
2008
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2009
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2010
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2011
January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December
2012
January, February, March, April, May
|
|
Not a member yet?
Qondio is a powerful network for making it online. If you have a website to
promote, we can help.
Sign up and get in on the action.
|
|
Welcome to Qondio! Discover the awesome power this network can deliver by going to our About page. Or you could skip straight to the Sign Up form.
|
|
