“You can’t ever go wrong with pearls. Perhaps pearls are a girl’s best friend after all.” – Ki Hackney.
To be honest, she couldn’t be more right. Pearls can truly change your jewellery game. It is no surprise that more and more of this gem can be seen on the runway, in the boardrooms and at weddings.
With this ever-growing popularity, there are also some suspicions adrift in the world of pearl jewellery, specifically regarding its authenticity.
Before we shed more light on that, let’s first understand, how different real pearls are from the fake ones.
Real Versus Fake
Fake pearls, (also called faux, imitation, synthetic or costume pearls) can be found abundantly in the market and are much cheaper than the real ones as they are made of plastic or glass. Same goes for the other fake gemstones.
Real pearls are organic gems, obtained from freshwater and saltwater oysters. They are born within living creatures and are prized for their natural and unique beauty.
To get an in-depth understanding of identifying the various gemstones, you should chequeout all quick and easy guide- ‘how to tell if gemstone is real ‘.
Here’s How You Can Tell Real Pearls From Fake Ones Without Taking the Tooth Test
Real pearls feel cold upon touching, which is not the case with fake pearls. They are also smooth around the drilled holes, while fake pearls are rough.
On the surface, real pearls display a base colour, plus an overtone. They also have a deeper lustre, as if they are glowing from within. Fake ones, on the other hand, showcase a uniform colour and shine only on the surface. They lack depth and an overtone.
Coming back to the question, “Are cultured pearls real?”
The answer is Yes!
More importantly, real pearls can be either natural or cultured. Here’s what we need to understand…
Natural Pearls
By natural pearls we mean, wild pearls that are naturally formed inside the oyster by chance and ‘without any human intervention’.
When a foreign element or an irritant gets accidentally trapped inside the oyster, the process of pearl formation begins. Layers and layers of nacre gets coated on the particle for a considerably long period of time and that’s when a natural pearl is formed.
Currently, natural pearls are almost extinct. They are also extremely expensive. For the longest time, only the royals and the affluent could afford them. However, it was a revolutionary moment in the history of pearls when humans started cultivating them in pearl farms in the year 1893.
Pearls were no more a thing of rarity and became more accessible to people. Cultivation of this gem made it more affordable too.
Here’s some more information for better understanding…
What are Cultured Pearls?
They are born within living pearl oysters and depending on the type of cultured pearl, the process can last several years. It will be erroneous to label cultured pearls as man-made or faux as the process of pearl formation remains the same.
What’s Different?
To initiate the process, pearl farmers surgically implant a bead nucleus into the oyster. The oyster then begins to coat the nucleus with nacreous layers, just like it does while creating pearls naturally.
Last but not the least, most of the pearls used in fine jewellery are cultured pearls, since the natural ones are almost completely depleted. Also, there are a couple of varieties of cultured pearls available that can leave you spoilt for choice.
So go ahead, explore, and find the perfect one for you.
