The Beauty of Pearls- Par Excellence

Pearls have been invaluable treasure pieces from time immemorial. It is the only gemstone, which grows inside a living organism. They are formed within oysters or also called mollusk. There are approximately 8000 various species of mollusks, of which only about 20 have the capability of consistent production of pearls.

Among the two types of pearls i.e. Natural pearls and cultured pearls, the natural pearls are very rare. Natural Pearls, which are round in shape or also spherical, are all the more so rare. Very limited quantity of the natural pearls is available from the mollusks and even amongst them, only a few develop the envisaged shape, size and color. On a standard basis, approximately the ratio of gem quality Pearls to Mollusks is one in thousandth.

Ownership of pearls would have been the privilege of the rich and wealthy, if we had relied solely on Nature. To avoid the over harvest scenario leading to the extinction of pearl engendering mollusks, the cultured pearls were made to work as a solution to it. Cultured Pearls are artificially produced through genetically modified means that entail insertion of the nucleus into the tissue of the Mollusk or the Oyster. Among the cultured pearls, you can feature the Akoya Pearls also known as Akoya Oyster. There are bead nucleated cultured pearls primarily in Japan, Australia, South Korea, Vietnam and China. Famous for their luster and viscose, they are considered as the classic pearls. They are normally characterized by white or cream color with silver, rose or cream overtones. They normally tend to be small and petite in size ranging from 2-11 mm. They are quite consistently round pearls rendering them ideal for matching a wide range of jewelry as bracelets and strands.

In Akoya pearl production, the Chinese have overtaken the Japanese in the recent years. The Chinese had limited access to it until the late 1990’s, but they had already started culturing Akoya Pearls way back in the 1960’s, shedding the tagline of inferior against the Japanese Counterparts. It is now engaged in the production of such pearls of unrivalled quality even beating the pre-eminent Japanese’ in the entire quality factor. The variants of Akoya Pearls have no standardized grading system that can measure its value. Nevertheless, Hanadama is the best Akoya Pearl produced as of now. There is more to know about Pearls and the sea of information is vast. Move on to find more on pearls.