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The iridescent nacre inside a nautilus shell Nacreous shell worked into a decorative object. Nacre (/ ˈ n eɪ k ər / NAY-kər, also / ˈ n æ k r ə / NAK-rə), [1] also known as mother-of-pearl, is an organic–inorganic composite material produced by some molluscs as an inner shell layer. It is also the material of which pearls are composed.
The cultured pearls on the market today can be divided into two categories. The first category covers the beaded cultured pearls, including Akoya, South Sea, Tahiti, and the large, modern freshwater pearl, the Edison pearl. These pearls are gonad-grown, and usually one pearl is grown at a time. This limits the number of pearls at a harvest period.
Kokichi Mikimoto (Japanese: 御木本 幸吉, Hepburn: Mikimoto Kōkichi, 25 January 1858 – 21 September 1954) was a Japanese entrepreneur who is credited with creating the first cultured pearl and subsequently starting the cultured pearl industry with the establishment of his luxury pearl company Mikimoto. [1] [2]
There are two different color varieties: the Gold-lipped oyster and the Silver-lipped oyster. These bivalves are the largest pearl oysters in the world. They have a very strong inner shell layer composed of nacre, also known as "mother of pearl" and are important to the cultured pearl industry as they are cultivated to produce South Sea pearls.
Cultured freshwater pearls are pearls that are farmed and created using freshwater mussels. These pearls are produced in Japan and the United States on a limited scale, but are now almost exclusively produced in China. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission requires that farmed freshwater pearls be referred to as "freshwater cultured pearls" in ...
Assorted keshi pearls. Keshi pearls are small non-nucleated pearls typically formed as by-products of pearl cultivation. A Japanese word also meaning "poppy" (ケシ, 芥子), it is used in Japanese for all pearls that grew without a nucleus. Originally, keshi pearls referred to those pearls formed when a bead nucleus was rejected.
Although these are a variety of cultured saltwater pearls, the amount of time that the pearls are cultured dramatically increases the depth of the nacre, and the likelihood of producing a baroque pearl. Most Tahitian pearl farm harvests, which, for example, produce more than 40 percent baroque and semi-baroque pearls.
Black South Sea pearls, or Tahitian pearls come from the black-lip oyster; gold and silver South Sea pearls from the gold-lip and silver-lip oysters; and Akoya cultured pearls from Pinctada fucata martensii, the Akoya pearl oyster. Pearls are also obtained in commercial quantities from some species of the closely related winged oyster genus Pteria.