Pearl

Black white, multicolor and mother of pearl meaning. Pearl is always a good choice for jewelry as necklace, stud earrings, bracelet or engagement ring
Black white, multicolor and mother of pearl meaning. Pearl is always a good choice for jewelry as necklace, stud earrings, bracelet or engagement ring.

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Pearl meaning

The original Japanese cultured pearls, known as akoya pearls, are produced by a species of small oyster, Pinctada fucata martensii, which is no bigger than 6 to 8 cm in size, hence akoya pearls larger than 10 mm in diameter are extremely rare and highly priced. Today, a hybrid mollusk is used in both Japan and China in the production of akoya pearls.

Black pearl

The Tahitian (or black)  is an organic gem formed from the black lip oyster (Pinctada margaritifera). These pearls derive their name from the fact that they are primarily cultivated around the islands of French Polynesia, around Tahiti.

Tahitian come in a range of colors from white to black. They can contain various undertones and overtones of green, pink, blue, silver and yellow. The most valuable of these are of the darker variety, as the naturally dark tones of the Tahitian is a unique quality.

A true black Tahitian pearl is extremely rare, and largely considered one of the most beautiful kinds of pearls in the world. Most Tahitian that are identified as “black” are actually charcoal grey, silver, or dark green. An advantage of the Tahitian pearl is that the oyster inside of which they grow is quite large, sometimes weighing as much as ten pounds. This means that a Tahitian can more easily grow to a larger-than-average size.

The cultured Tahitian pearl comes in various shapes, sizes, and colors; shapes include round, semi-round, button, circle, oval, teardrop, semi-baroque and baroque. Because of their darker hues, Tahitian are commonly known as “black pearls”.

However, Tahitian pearls have the ability to contain various undertones and overtones of green, pink, blue, silver and yellow. All of these colors may be seen in a cultured Tahitian . Due to the variety of shapes and colors of the Tahitian pearl, it has been known to fit in any jewelry setting. The versatility and mixture of color give it its value.

Market

Today, the cultured pearls on the market can be divided into two categories. The first category covers the beaded cultured, including Akoya, South Sea and Tahiti. These pearls are gonad grown, and usually one pearl is grown at a time.

This limits the number of pearls at a harvest period. The pearls are usually harvested after one year for akoya, 2 to 4 years for Tahitian and South Sea, and 2–7 years for freshwater. This perliculture process was first developed by the British biologist William Saville-Kent who passed the information along to Tatsuhei Mise and Tokichi Nishikawa from Japan.

The second category includes the non-beaded freshwater cultured , like the Biwa or Chinese pearls. As they grow in the mantle, where on each wing up to 25 grafts can be implanted, these pearls are much more frequent and saturate the market completely.

An impressive improvement in quality has taken place in the last ten years when the former rice-grain-shaped pebbles are compared with the near round of today. In the last two years large near perfect round bead nucleated up to 15mm in diameter have been produced with metallic luster.

The nucleus bead in a beaded cultured pearl is generally a polished sphere made from freshwater mussel shell. Along with a small piece of mantle tissue from another mollusk, donor shell, to serve as a catalyst for the pearl sac, it is surgically implanted into the gonad, reproductive organ, of a saltwater mollusk.

In freshwater perliculture, only the piece of tissue is used in most cases, and is inserted into the fleshy mantle of the host mussel. South Sea and Tahitian oysters, also known as Pinctada maxima and Pinctada margaritifera, which survive the subsequent surgery to remove the finished pearl, are often implanted with a new, larger beads as part of the same procedure and then returned to the water for another 2 to 3 years of growth.

Akoya pearls

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