The Book of the Pearl Its History Art Science and Industry
Officially the world'south oldest jewel, pearls take been revered since long earlier written history. For this reason, their discovery cannot be attributed to one person in particular, only information technology is believed that they were starting time discovered by people searching for food forth the seashore. We know that they have been worn every bit a form of adornment for millennia thanks to a fragment of pearl jewellery plant in the sarcophagus of a Persian princess that dates dorsum to 420 BC, which is at present on display at the Louvre in Paris.
Pearls were presented as gifts to Chinese royalty equally early as 2300 BC, while in ancient Rome, pearl jewellery was considered the ultimate status symbol. So precious were the spherical gems that in the 1st century BC, Julius Caesar passed a law limiting the wearing of pearls just to the ruling classes.
The abundance of natural oyster beds in the Persian Gulf meant that pearls besides carried great importance in Arab cultures, where legend stated that pearls were formed from dewdrops that were swallowed by oysters when they cruel into the sea. Before the advent of cultured pearls, the Persian Gulf was at the centre of the pearl trade and information technology was a source of wealth in the region long before the discovery of oil.
With such a long and ancient history, it is no wonder that, over time, the pearl became shrouded in myth and legend. In ancient China, pearl jewellery was said to symbolise the purity of the wearer while, in the Nighttime Ages, knights frequently wore pearls on the battleground, assertive that the precious gemstones would keep them safe. According to legend, Cleopatra crushed a pearl into a drinking glass of wine to evidence to Marc Antony that she could give the most expensive dinner in history.
Pearls have been an important trade article since Roman times, and the discovery of pearls in Cardinal and Due south America in the 15th and 16th century led to the so-called Pearl Age. With the escalating need for pearls in Western Europe, where ladies of nobility and royalty wore elaborate pearl necklaces, earrings, pearl bracelets and brooches, by the 19th century, demand for pearl jewellery became so high that oyster supplies began to dwindle.
Unlike gemstones that are mined from the earth, a living organism produces a pearl and, in fact, their very beingness is a freak of nature. A pearl is formed when an irritant, such as a parasite or piece of shell, becomes accidentally lodged in an oyster's soft inner body, causing it to secrete a crystalline substance chosen nacre, which builds upward around the irritant in layers until a pearl is formed. Cultured pearls are formed through the aforementioned process, the only difference being that the irritant is implanted in the oyster rather than entering it past chance.
Until the start of the twentyth century, the just style of collecting pearls was through divers risking their lives at depths of up to 100ft to retrieve the pearl oysters. Information technology was a dangerous pursuit and i that carried limited chance of success as a ton of oysters would throw up only iii or four quality pearls. Freshwater molluscs living in shallow rivers and streams were easier to gather, simply these pearl beds were often reserved for harvesting by royalty.
Today, natural pearls are among the rarest of gems and their almost entirely depleted supply ways that they are found very infrequently only in the seas off Bahrain and Australia. The scarcity of natural pearls is reflected in the prices they fetch at auction, with antique pearl necklaces and earrings selling for record-breaking sums. Last year, a pair of natural pearl earrings - left - which once belonged to Empress Eugenie of France, married woman of Napoleon Bonaparte - set a new globe record when they sold for U.s.a.$three.3 meg at Doyle New York.
Observe the tape-breaking pearls in history here.
Intense bidding wars have also erupted over high-quality natural pearl necklaces with the winning bids running into several meg dollars. Elizabeth Taylor's famous La Peregrina 16th century pearl, which sold for U.s.a.$eleven.8 million, is a case in indicate. Unlike the shatterproof diamond, the formation of natural pearls is dependent on make clean seas and stable temperatures, both of which have been thrown into disarray by pollution and global warming. Virtually all pearl jewellery on the market today is made using pearls that take been cultivated and farmed.
Kokichi Mikimoto, the son of a Japanese noodle maker, created the world's first cultured pearl in 1893 past manually introducing an irritant into an oyster to stimulate it to class a pearl. The introduction of cultured pearls in the early on 1900s turned the whole pearl industry on its head and acquired the value of natural pearls to collapse. By 1935, there were 350 pearl farms in Japan, producing ten million cultured pearls a year, although Mikimoto had to constantly defend himself against accusations that his pearls were not "existent". The scientific evidence spoke to the contrary; the cultivated pearls had the verbal same properties equally those formed in deep sea beds, the but difference was that they had a helping hand at getting the natural procedure started.
Mikimoto's Akoya pearls are still used today by the jewellery business firm that bears his proper name and are renowned for their brilliant lustre and rich colours, which range from white, cream and pinkish, to argent pink.
Pearls can be establish, or cultivated, in freshwater or saltwater and there are several dissimilar types of pearls depending on what mollusc they originate from. Cultured freshwater pearls are produced mainly in China and, due to their abundance, they are more affordable than their saltwater cousins. Saltwater pearls include the aforementioned Akoya besides as Tahitian pearls, which originate from Tahiti and other islands in French Polynesia. South Sea pearls hail from Commonwealth of australia, Indonesia and the Philippines. The latter is the largest of all the pearl varieties and come in white, cream or aureate hues with sizes ranging from 9mm to 20mm. A Tahitian pearl is as well known as a black pearl, although its colour spectrum besides includes greyness, blue, green and purple.Read more nearly Tahitian pearls here.
Coloured pearls were popular with both men and women as far back every bit the 17thursday century and, in recent years, these nighttime wonders of the sea have seen a revival, with a new generation of mode-witting consumers embracing jewellery featuring coloured pearls every bit an edgier alternative to the traditional white pearl necklace.
"Bizarre" is a term applied to pearls that are non-symmetrical, and these irregular shapes are more mutual in freshwater pearls. While perfectly round pearls have traditionally been the nigh coveted, baroque South Bounding main or Tahitian pearls are frequently used in unique, contemporary jewellery to great effect.
Strictly speaking, oysters only produce pearls, but some gems that are created in other molluscs likewise authorize for this moniker. These include incredibly rare, oval-shaped conch pearls and yellowish-orange Melo Melo pearls. These non-nacreous pearls are formed by a substance composed mainly of calcite, and while they lack the iridescence of nacreous pearls, their beauty is no less spectacular.
Ranging in colour from yellowish to coral cerise, with soft pink being the virtually pop color, conch pearls cannot be cultivated and are but plant in ane in every x,000 Queen conch molluscs. As a result, conch pearls are incredibly valuable and fifty-fifty a pea-sized gem tin can fetch as much as US$120,000. Mikimoto recently launched a collection of conch pearl jewellery, and the distinctive pink pearls take besides been incorporated into jewels by the likes of Boucheron jewellery and Tiffany & Co.
Likewise incredibly beautiful and sought after are abalone pearls, which are amid the rarest in the world as they are not cultured and only institute by chance in rocky, littoral waters.
In terms of their fashion currency, pearls take had something of a bumpy journey, particularly in the latter half of the 20th century. In the 1920s, pearl necklaces in the form of simple strands reflected the way for streamlined, unfussy designs. Known every bit sautoirs, these long necklaces would frequently measure more than 30 inches and be decorated with a tassel as a pendant. "A woman needs ropes and ropes of pearls," declared Coco Chanel, who was rarely seen without a pile of pearls casually worn effectually her neck. She shocked society ladies past mixing the real thing with fakes and teaming her pearls with casual daywear. Largely thanks to her endorsement, costume jewellery became popular and many women wore imitation pearl jewellery made from Lucite or glass.
Inspired past Mademoiselle's passion for the gem, in 2014 Chanel launched a high jewellery collection devoted to the classic pearl. The Perles Swing set, consisting of a pearl bracelet, necklace and earrings, is a strikingly elementary but elegant combination of pastel-coloured South Sea, Tahitian and freshwater cultured pearls.
Jackie Kennedy is another pearl-wearing icon whose signature triple strand pearl necklace actually consisted of imitation gems made from glass rather than the real bargain. Audrey Hepburn's name is also synonymous with pearls, exist it a necklace or a pair of pearl earrings subtly accentuating her gamine features.
Somewhere effectually the 1980s pearls gained a reputation as the preserve of older ladies in twinsets with blue-rinse hairdos. Now, notwithstanding, the tide is turning and pearls are once once again back in favour with the fashionable gear up. A number of top jewellery houses prominently feature pearls in their high jewellery collections and they are as well being incorporated into gimmicky jewellery designs past innovative designers such as Kova. Read nigh how to wear pearls in 2016 hither.
As with gemstones, the quality of a pearl is adamant by several criteria including its size, shape, color and lustre. An important factor to expect out for is the thickness of the nacre every bit this determines not merely the pearl's lustre simply too how long information technology will terminal. Dissimilar the more robust diamond, pearls require a bit of TLC to ensure they stay looking pristine. Pearl jewellery should always be stored separately from diamonds to ensure the harder stone does not scratch their surface. We would recommend putting pearl jewels into a cloth bag earlier placing them in the jewellery box. Acidic elements such as perfume and even perspiration can boring a pearl's lustre, and then never spray scent direct onto them and wipe the pearls before putting them away. In the instance of pearl necklaces, information technology is a good idea to take them to a jeweller every five years to cheque whether they need re-stringing.
Traditionally, pearls were historic for their uniformity in size and color but now information technology seems the more avant-garde, the better. Pearls in vibrant colours and unusual shapes are being incorporated into unique jewels by jewellers renowned for their creativity, such as Boghossian and Hemmerle, while YOKO London offers an incredibly wide palette of coloured pearls so vibrant it's difficult to believe they were formed naturally - far removed from the traditional discreet white pearl studs gracing the ear lobes of ladies who dejeuner.
In 2015 Annoushka launched the Golden Pearls collection exclusively at Harrods to celebrate 25 years as a jewellery designer. The Art Deco-inspired necklace, pendants, earrings and cocktail pearl ring showcase rare South Sea pearls with a deep and perfectly unblemished golden lustre from Iloilo - an exotic island in the Philippines that Annoushka credits with kick-starting her career in jewellery blueprint.
At Baselworld 2015, Australian pearl company Autore launched the Orchid collection, inspired by the indiginous blooms of Commonwealth of australia. The magnificent array of perfectly matched South Sea and Tahitian pearls, combined with flowers fashioned out of coloured gemstones, were all plucked from the sea off the declension of Australia because not only does Autore produce exquisite pearl jewellery, it also owns a thriving pearl subcontract and is a big thespian in the international Due south Sea pearl business concern.
From dramatic black pearls with their dark, iridescent shimmer to perfectly imperfect bizarre pearls, these miracles of the sea have get a must-have gem in one case over again as they step confidently into the 21st century.
Source: http://www.thejewelleryeditor.com/jewellery/article/history-of-pearls-pearl-jewellery-rings-earrings-necklaces/
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