Mixed Feelings After My Trip To Birks Today PP Freshadamas The Best Freshwater Pearls ????

[ChunkyCushionLover]

Dear Pearl Lovers,

As I increase my education on pearls I came to a sad revelation today which I wanted to share with others to see if they have had similar experiences.
I took my fiance's recently bough 8 - 9mm White With Slight Rose Overtone Freshadamas bought from Pearl Paradise to Birks in Montreal.

We setup a lineup 3 strands side by side. (I wasn't allowed to photograph them)

Strand 1 Handamas white with slight green overtone 8 - 8.5mm.
Strand 2 My Fiance's White with Slight Rose Overone 8 - 9mm Freshadamas
Strand 3 Birks Freshwater Pearls 8 - 8.5 Rose Overtone

In terms of roundness the three were about the same with hanadamas being superior to the other two.
In terms of lustre the hanadama ~ Birks Freshwater > Freshadama

Now granted the Hanadama was like$ 9000, Freshwater $1600 and Freshadama like $800 but I was a little disappointed as I always assumed freshadamas would have the best lustre of any freshwater pearl and I was quite mistaken.

Questions:

1) Does the rose overtone being stronger contribute to the appearance of better lustre?
2) Do strong jewelry lights tend to favour pearls with stronger color overtones and this is skewing my perception?

I should also add that we viewed the pearls on top of white leather, on the skin the differences are noticeable but a lot less so.
I look forward to some expert opinions.

Regards,
CCL

 

[DiaDiva]

CCL, too bad you weren''t allowed to take photos and I''m hardly an expert so don''t want to speculate. Why don''t you call PP and tell Jeremy what happened?

 

[pearlie]

There are no universal standards for grading pearls. Period. What you experienced is a result of this.

Pearl Paradise''s freshadama pearls are the finest quality freshwater pearls in THEIR inventory. PP is also the only store that sells anything called "freshadama" They were the one''s who coined this term. They have a standard of characteristics that they look for in order to "certify", if you will, a strand of pearls as "freshadama".

Nobody else does this. Which is why it is best if consumers do not rely on a letter grading system for comparison, and use their senses instead.

Overtone is a matter of preference. If you prefer rose overtones, maybe that''s why your eye was drawn to them. Luster is luster, it''s the quality and well as the quantity of light returned.

 

[simplysplendid]

Hi,

Did you take them down from your fiancee's neck for comparison? If you did, I'd say try cleaning your freshadamas and head to the store for another comparison.
I think you made the choice after comparing the PP hanadamas to the freshadamas. Hanadamas in PP is not much, if any difference from hanadamas sold anywhere. I am most interested to know why your fresahamas would suddenly pale in comparison to the hanadamas at birks when it is comparable to the hanadamas at PP.

After I wear my pearls, they do look less lustrous than when they are clean. So clean your pearls often, I clean mine after every wear. I use a damp cotton pad to run through every pearl, careful not to wet the silk thread and wipe them dry with a soft tissue paper.

Try it and let us know how it goes.

 

[innerkitten]

I'd love to see what these Birk's freshwaters look like because they sound very nice. I've never heard of them before. Not sure what to say but things can vary strand to strand. When I got my freshadamas I didn't love them and sent them back for another strand which I totally loved. Couldn't hurt to give Jeremy a call.

 

[ChunkyCushionLover]

Date: 12/18/2009 11:37:44 PM
Author: simplysplendid
Hi,

Did you take them down from your fiancee's neck for comparison? If you did, I'd say try cleaning your freshadamas and head to the store for another comparison.
I think you made the choice after comparing the PP hanadamas to the freshadamas. Hanadamas in PP is not much, if any difference from hanadamas sold anywhere. I am most interested to know why your fresahamas would suddenly pale in comparison to the hanadamas at birks when it is comparable to the hanadamas at PP.

After I wear my pearls, they do look less lustrous than when they are clean. So clean your pearls often, I clean mine after every wear. I use a damp cotton pad to run through every pearl, careful not to wet the silk thread and wipe them dry with a soft tissue paper.

Try it and let us know how it goes.

Hi Simplysplendid,

Yes they were all set on top of a leather white board. I cleaned the Freshadamas with the provided cleaning pack and cloth prior to the test.
I can't tell if I did a good enough job cleaning them but I would assume so.

If you look at my previous the thread https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/can-anyone-spot-which-ones-are-the-hanadamas.128510/ you can see the two akoyas and hanadama strands having better lustre (or different lustre), I made the choice because we moved up to 8 - 9mm and that gets very expensive in Hanadama and Akoya AAA more than I wanted to spend. But I think the differences in a picture are much harder to see than in real life. I posted pictures of our strands in that thread and the mismatch in overtones is evident though.

My fiance(she) who is wearing them thinks I am positively crazy so I'd have to wrestle them from her hands to even consider sending them back to Jeremy who I have no doubt would be willing to send us another strand, however the bracelet and the necklace both had inferior lustre to what I saw in Birks freshwater so unless both are from the same pool of beads I'd assume another strand would not improve unless I changed our overtone preference.

I think the weakest part of the necklace is that the overtones are not perfectly matched so some are more rose than others.
Part of me feels the lustre is different when looking at strong rose overtone versus a weaker rose. I am considering contacing PP again, they have been great so far.

The nice thing about all of this is that despite my new education my Fiance is very happy with them and probably wouldn't care to change.

Regards,
CCL

 

[ChunkyCushionLover]

Date: 12/19/2009 9:55:40 AM
Author: innerkitten
I''d love to see what these Birk''s freshwaters look like because they sound very nice. I''ve never heard of them before. Not sure what to say but things can vary strand to strand. When I got my freshadamas I didn''t love them and sent them back for another strand which I totally loved. Couldn''t hurt to give Jeremy a call.

Thanks for the info if my Fiance lets me return them I will call Jeremy. Maybe I can twist the arm of the floor manager at Birks to let me take a picture but it is against their policy.

 

[simplysplendid]

Hi CCL,

I am totally with your fiancee - the sentimental value on the strand she received is more important than how the lustre on the pearls compared to other pearls.

I remember that thread now, yes, I recall it was mentioned on that thread that the lustre on the freshwater pearls is different from that on akoyas with freshies having a softer glow whereas akoyas as a mirror like, even metallic shine in hanadamas.

I agree with the others that perhaps you should email Jeremy or speak to him about it, I am sure he will be happy to make a switch. If your fiancee is sentimental about the freshadamas she received, hey, you can always plan for a perfect strand of hanadamas on your first wedding anniversary

. That said, I do recall reading from other forums that different pearl vendors focus on different aspects on their top of the line freshies - something about PP focusing on orient, others focusing on roundness etc. Perhaps the freshies from Birk focus on luster (that''s pure speculation on my part).

 

[brightlight]

The difference in luster between the Birks strand and the freshadamas may be due to two things. Because the Birks strand is smaller, the luster may look "tighter." Also, the variation in color due to the different strength of the rose overtone in the freshadama strand could affect how "tight" the luster looks.

I also want to add that if the Birks strand has a consistent rose, it''s *possible* they could have been pinked. It''s also very possible the rose overtone is natural. Top of the line freshwater and akoya pearls are harder to come by as you go up in size, so it could also be that there were more top of the line pearls to choose from in the smaller size range.