Wednesday 24 June 2015

The Pearl with an Edge

Pearls have been coveted for thousands of years, which have a natural beauty. This beauty comes from nature itself; hence the pearl is referred to as “The Queen of the Sea”. In the year 1998, faceting of Pearls was introduced. Thus,the pure and natural beauty can now be accentuated through faceting.

This was started by Komatsu Diamond Industry, a Japanese diamond-cutting company with 20 years of experimentation, which resulted in these miniature marvels that has up to 200 facets.



About
A pearl consists of thousands of microscopic thin layers of mother of pearl. Layers of good quality will reflect light on the surface of the pearl and hereby create a beautiful luster.If the pearl has orient, the mother of pearl is of exceptional quality and the light will be reflected and glow from the very inside of the pearl and through all layers of nacre.

How it is done
The pearls are faceted by hand using diamond cutting, no coating or any other kind of treatment are added to the pearls. By faceting pearls we can accentuate the specific characteristics they have from nature and give them an exciting new expression.

Cut pearls can have between 100 and 200 facets, all of which are smaller and more numerous than the facets of a cut diamond.

Russian designer IlgizIlgiz Fazulzyanov for Poppies earrings in yellow gold with enameled poppies, diamonds and faceted pearl.


Ideal  Pearls for Faceting
The pearls selected for faceting must be high quality South Sea, Akoya, Tahitian black pearls or freshwater pearls. Such pearls must be perfectly round and have a thick layer of nacre.

Because only high quality pearls are selected for faceting and only skilled cutters can facet precisely, a faceted pearl may cost three or four times that of an uncut pearl. As such, inferior quality pearls cannot be enhanced by faceting. A poor quality pearl remains a poor quality pearl unsuitable for cutting.

Thus, faceted pearls an innovation from the diamond cutters!!

To learn more about diamond designing courses visit Solitaire Diamond Institute Bangalore.



Article by: Sheela Veeraganti
Jewellery Designing Student, SDI.

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