Pearls are the only gems that are formed by a living creature on earth and normally
it takes about 2 years to for a pearl tog et formed and attain a solid and regular shape. Few types of natural pearls take as long as 5 years. Even in the cultured pearl technology, though the production period of a pearl got down to a marginal extent, it still takes 12-18months for certain types of cultured pearls to form. 95 out of every 100 pearls available today are the cultured pearls.
Type of Pearl by their source
Pearls are classified by into natural and cultured by their source of origin nature.
1. Natural These are naturally formed from a living creature. The mossulc is naturally entered into the shell and a pearl is formed after many months or even years. Natural weather conditions help in the process of formation of pearls. There's no contribution of man in the development of a natural pearl. With the increase in the pollution of air and water, the natural pearl production is stopped in recent years.
2. Cultured This technology is first developed and produced in Japan. Later Chinese too have learned the technology of growing pearls artificially in a pearl farm. The irritant matter is also manually inserted into the mollusk and the pearl is grown with right care and attention under artificial environmental conditions.
Classification by Pearl Shape
Pearls are also classified by the shape thy attain after the formation of the gem from the nacre. They are mainly 3 types of pearls by their shapes. They are round, symmetrical and baroque type of pearls.
This is a little known classification. Pearls are also classified on the shape they attain. The three major types are Spherical, Symmetrical and Baroque shaped pearls.
Spherical or Round shaped pearls are most popular and thus are expensive than the rest of the pearl shapes. Irregularly and unevenly shaped pearls are called Baroque pearls. These are less bought or worn and thus are cheap.