| Hi Pattye! That was brilliant! That post need to also be in maybe the Tucson Thread. It is a very good summary of how buying commercial pearls works.
Commercial pearls may have brilliant luster in non-round shapes. I got two 9mm White buttons strands with some of the best luster of any of my pearls, just as one example. The pearls near the sales table will be the best quality. You will pay a lot more if you try to cherry pick one of those with no other purchase. The price goes down the more other pearls you buy.
I think it is to be expected that there will be some worse pearls in a lot of strands. As with the sizes, the quality is carefully parceled out among each strands. Otherwise they would end up with all the ugly pearls. Like the size thing. If you buy 7-8 MM, the center few pearls will be the biggest and they will taper slightly in size to the back. They do that in 5-6 6-7 also, but it is not quite as obvious. It's so they don't end up with nothing but ugly pearls.
I once had to buy 30 strands (They were $3-4 a strand) to get one strand where every pearl was a klonk-(12mm+) in real measurements. Only the pearl in the center was 12mm or more, One center bead was 14mm and it had 2 twelves next to it. But there was only one like that in the entire lot!
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Caitlin  potamilus purpuratus American Pearl Mussel Where can I get a pearl from this mussel?
Last edited by Caitlin; 02-26-2008 at 08:57 PM.
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