[gabrielamaria]

I ve bought in Italy a necklace of what the seller calls " fresh water pearls", with beads of exactly 30 mm diameter, heavy, with an homogeneus metalic white thick nacre. Without granulations over surface, can be noticed the presence of grooves.
I fell in love with this giant " pearls" , but now I m feeling a little ashamed of 360 euros ( about 450 dollars)... All the other articles at this shop were natural , good quality and real.
Any help??
thanks a lot all.
gabriela

[jerin]

Hi and welcome amongst us Pearl Guiders,

Could you post a photo?
I hope the strand consists not of shell pearls, that would be fake pearls made out of mother of pearl. They always look perfect (no blemishes and fine luster). But as you say there are grooves, that can´t be, the size of 30 mm does sound gigantic for "real" pearls, whatever mollusk they might have come from...

Anyway, if you like the strand you should wear it with pride regardless wheter it´s real or not. If they are Shell pearls, I think you paid a high price.

[Nicole]

I would like to see a photo, too. Are you sure that the pearls are 30mm? That sounds crazy huge to me!

Nicole

[Valeria101]

The are definitely fake.. but I don't think you have any reason to feel bad about the price. OK, so it wasn't cheap costume jewelry... they are what they are. It is not possible to have any type of natural pearls in such size, so if you like very large beads, the look can only be from something artificial. 30mm round beads would be instantly recognizable as something artificial. That's part of the fun.

You can definitely have freshwater pearls for the money. Their typical size is about 10mm - only rarely a bit over.

How big do strands round cultured pearls go? Only about this much: LINK to 17-21mm strand. Perhaps there are a few larger baroque or button pearls somewhere... who knows. Their price is good indication of how scarce these sizes are.

The easiest way to get a bold look from freshwater pearls is just to use allot of them - thick torsade necklaces and long multiple strand ropes come t mind. Someone had a 3 meter long rope made and posted here a couple of days ago.

30mm round pearls? No... That simply cannot happen.

Speaking of huge: weird shapes of nucleated freshwater pearls grow as giants like THESE. These are still unusual merchandise, but that's changing. So if you like their look, you are in luck!

2c

[gabrielamaria]

I m trying to find the USB port cord to put the digital picture of my necklace And really you are right: my " pearls" are obviously impossible natural, so , that is the beautifull ...It´s like to scream " I do love pearls!" yet if nature doesnt make them at this size...
I did not understand the matter about nucleated and size. Can you explain to me this ?
thanks all. Soon the picture will be here.

[gabrielamaria]

Originally Posted by jerin

Hi and welcome amongst us Pearl Guiders,

Could you post a photo?
I hope the strand consists not of shell pearls, that would be fake pearls made out of mother of pearl. They always look perfect (no blemishes and fine luster). But as you say there are grooves, that can´t be, the size of 30 mm does sound gigantic for "real" pearls, whatever mollusk they might have come from...

Anyway, if you like the strand you should wear it with pride regardless wheter it´s real or not. If they are Shell pearls, I think you paid a high price.

I do like your point about using them if I do like them!.. thats exactly true!

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by gabrielamaria

I did not understand the matter about nucleated and size. Can you explain to me this ?

Please show those pearls on you! I've tried to figure out what beads so large would look like They sound so bold!


As for size & nucleation... Hm.... I think it goes like this:

- the more nacre a mollusk has to produce, the longer it takes to make a pearl and for the humans harvesting the pearls... time is money! of curse, there is more nacre in a pearl w/o nucleus, so they take longer culture time.


There are other reasons why nucleated pearls make more economic sense. And I am afraid that this will make cultured pearls w/o a nucleus disappear one day... I would rather that didn't happen, but ...

[gabrielamaria]

As soon as I can put a new USB cord, I will put the pic! I m so anxious about you all can see the pics and tell me what you think...
Now, another question: is it possible to put whatever size of nucleous inside a mollusc,if the animal is big enough?
I do love that tiny pearls of about 2 mm ... but I do dream with a bigger one!
soon the pics come.
thanks again!

[Valeria101]

Originally Posted by gabrielamaria

...is it possible to put whatever size of nucleus inside a mollusk, if the animal is big enough?

My previous post (with the pictures) was abut nucleated pearls and answers the question: no you cannot really get over 20mm. That is what the largest pearl-making mollusks can bear. And 20m is hugely rare.

20mm beads already feel like a strand of cherries to me And no, I have never touched a strand of real pearls that large ... just other kinds of beads.

[Bodecia]

Hi gabrielamaria,

Imitation and Shell Pearls (imitation) can look beautiful and that is generally a glance is enough to scream imitation. Many people love them though so there is no reason why you cannot enjoy them. If you have the receipt for them though or access to the shop itself I would approach the sellers and demand my money back. That was way too much to pay.

But we all live and learn and often by our mistakes. I have trusted photos only to end up with huge shell pearls. I was livid though although I didn't pay much. My mother-in-law loves them. I think she would be too scared to wear them if they were "real" pearls, come to think of it I might be too. Scared of loosing them that is.

Bodecia