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BEST PRICE GUARANTEE: If you order any item today then see it at a lower price on our website (up to 20/12/2023), tell us and we'll happily refund the difference (Terms)

How Pearls Are Prepared

After carefully tending their pearl farms for months, or even years, things don’t get any easier for pearl producers when they harvest their crops. As few as half of the molluscs they have been looking after will have produced a pearl, and even if they do, many will not be good enough to sell.

Those that are still have a long way to go before they appear on one of the pearl necklaces at Absolute Pearls. Pearl preparation takes several stages:

  • Finishing – unlike rough diamonds, pearls emerge from their shell fully formed and beautiful. However like a new baby, they need cleaning up. New pearls are gently bleached to remove any tissue or residue from the mollusc and lightly polished to enhance their natural sheen.
  • Sorting – pearls are then sorted, or graded, by their size, shape, colour, lustre and quality to assess their value and to help with the matching process which comes later. Since the qualities of pearls are so subjective most sorting is done by hand.
  • Drilling – before they can be used in our jewellery, pearls need to be drilled by highly skilled craftsmen. Pearls for strands, such as necklaces and bracelets are fully drilled, while pearls for earrings and other jewellery are only half drilled. A pearl drill is more like a lathe, and the pearl is drilled from both sides with great precision. Unlike a gemstone, it cannot be re-cut if you get it wrong, so precision is everything.
  • Matching – with so much variation in the different qualities of a pearl, finding matching sets can be extremely time consuming. Skilled pearl matchers may need to look through as many as 10,000 pearls to find the 60 or so closely matching pearls needed for a 16 inch string.
  • Threading – once the pearls have been finished, sorted, drilled and matched, they are threaded onto strands ready for sale to the pearl jewellery industry.
  • Stringing – jewellers take a strand of pearls and thread them using silk thread to create a necklace or other jewellery. The thread is knotted between each pearl to prevent losing more than one pearl if the string breaks. Knots also reduce wear from pearls rubbing together and add length to the string. It is quite a skill to get the right spacing and tension for a truly attractive string of pearls.

Terms & Conditions

Terms for 'BLACK25' Discount Code:

  • Expires 11:59pm on Thursday 30th November 2023.
  • Can be used on any jewellery item EXCEPT any item that is already discounted (shown by a red coloured price with the original price crossed out).
  • Only valid for online purchases.
  • Discount is only applied to the product cost and not to gift wrapping or upgraded delivery charges.
  • Each code cannot be used in conjunction with any other Absolute Pearls discount code. (Only one discount code can be used for any one purchase)
  • The Discount Code must be entered into the 'Discount Code' field and the 'Apply Code' button clicked to apply it. It is the customer's responsibility to ensure the code has been applied prior to proceeding and paying for the order.
  • Any discount code cannot be applied retrospectively.
  • This offer may be withdrawn at any time without notice and is subject to availability.

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Terms for Best Price Guarantee:

  • If you buy any product from Absolute Pearls between 4th November 2023 to 20th December 2023 inclusive and subsequentially find that same product offered at a lower price on the Absolute Pearls website on or before 20th December 2023, we will happily refund you the difference.
  • Product discounts and available discount codes will be used to determine the lowest price available of any item on any given day and do not include postage or gift wrapping charges.
  • This best price guarantee does NOT apply if you fail to use/successfully apply the code in the checkout (for whatever reason) the best available discount code available on the day and which are available on the website banners and the New Subscribers mailing list sign up box. If in doubt, please email us on service@absolutepearls.co.uk or call 01516257688 for guidance & information on discount codes.
  • To claim, you simply need to email us (service@absolutepearls.co.uk) on the same day when you see the lower price, and include the following details: your name, your order number, the product code number and the date and lower price you saw on the Absolute Pearls website. Please also send us a screenshot or photo of said product and lower price.
  • If the same product (same SKU number) is offered at a price lower than you paid, we will refund the difference to you by the end of December.
  • The 'Best Price Guarantee' only applies to the Absolute Pearls website (www.absolutepearls.co.uk)

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