The Story Of Real Pearls

By Author: Alan Smith
Total Articles: 21
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Popularly believed to be come from a mermaid’s tear, a pearl is the only kind of valuable jewelry that comes closest in being a cent percent organic. It needs very little work when compared to other valuable metals and gems used in jewelry. Pearls can be natural, cultured natural, a mix of natural and synthetic, and completely artificial.

The value is directly proportional to how natural the pearls are. Natural ones that are found at random enclosed within oysters and mussels are the rarest, hence the most expensive. The most commonly found real ones are cultured. The oysters or mussels are tended to with a small piece of foreign material which the inner body by its natural tendency starts to drape with nacre. The other kind which is widespread is artificial. Watch out for the adjectives such as fake, faux, manmade, synthetic, simulated, resin, glass, plastic, etc.

So you’re buying pearl jewelry for the ...
... first time. Maybe surprise your special lady. After you’ve overcome the challenging part of deciding what to buy – earrings, ring, necklace, length of necklace, what kind of pearls, and so on, it is important that you get what you paid for. Buying artificial pearls is easy. But buying real pearls can get difficult since to the first timer as all pearls would probably look the same.

If you carefully observe, real pearls are not necessarily round or have the perfect luster since they’re organically formed. When observed under the magnifying glass, the body shows cues of a ring or ridges around the hole drilled for say, a pearl necklace. When taken out in sunlight or very bright indoor light, the real pearl would display magnificent luminosity and depth in its luster. Except for very expensive pearls, they would normally shine out various colors and overtones while reflecting the light.

Manmade pearls on minute observation would sometimes show a tiny glass flake or plastic distinctly especially near the drilled holes. Sometimes, minor chippings and scratches are also visible on them. Real ones are a bit hefty than fake ones. In a real pearl necklace, mostly there will be knots between all the beads and the holes drilled will be as small as they can be since the idea is to use them without drastically altering their original form. It is also said that the authentic ones feel a bit gritty when rubbed across our teeth.

And so goes on the story of real pearls encircling their various births and diverse destinations.