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Originally Posted by jshepherd
The one I described is considered very fine. Paspaley is the only company I know of that can consistently produce them of this quality. I have never seen a full lot from another company, although I have seen good, clean 17mm pieces.
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Just wanted to add to the previous post along these lines: the pearls I was referring to (that are easy to locate at etc.) would at most be unblemished or nearly so. Nothing aside size and lack of dimples seems to count.
The epiphany about these large SS came in a NYC pearl den (a previously seller to the trade only recently opened to laymen via a gritty website), with the bored sales guy taking time to show two 16 to 18 graduated strands side by side: one around 30k, one more than ten times that (round, no dimples). I am afraid that the large SS I have seen since are definitely in the neighbourhood of the 'cheap' set. Not sure what the jeweler thought they were teaching, but the sight of those two soured SS pearls to me for good... the best are clearly not going to happen in that price bracket, and the common type just looks like &^#% by comparison.
Up to 15mm there is allot more choice. Would rather have a smaller fine pair - although 'smaller' sounds funny; fine 15 mm-ish pearls would look very impressive on.