What determines the price of natural pearls?

[jnl123]

i'm new to pearls and I've been looking at a few pairs of natural saltwater pearls through reputable auction houses; i.e. doyle and bonams. Looking at all the sold natural saltwater pearls I see they all come with GIA paperwork. Some go for 1-3k while others sell for 20k plus. The difference between them isn't obvious. Some pearls obviously have a large mm or the necklace has more pearls but it seems in most cases the pearls that cost 20k aren't much bigger or there isn't that many more pearls than the ones that sell for 1k-3k. What is determining the price?

 

[torontocatlady]

Although I don't have the answer for you, I too am curious. Watching this thread! Hopefully someone with pearl expertise is able to help

 

[cmd2014]

Sometimes it's provenance (i.e., they belonged to someone famous, or can be traced through history). Most often it's things like the type of pearls in the strand as well as size, shape, luster, surface clarity, and the level of matching throughout the strand. And there is a difference between truly natural pearls which are exceedingly rare (as they are formed in nature without any human intervention and tend to be antiques) and cultured pearls (which are real pearls, but are formed when a pearl farmer grafts either a bead nucleus or piece of mantle tissue into a pearl oyster). Sometimes cultured pearls are mistakenly called 'natural pearls' in order to assure people that they are genuine, when they are not actually natural pearls but cultured pearls. There are also huge price differences between the various types of pearls. Gold South Sea and White South Sea are typically the most expensive, followed by Tahitian and Akoya (although top quality Akoya in a large size can be much more expensive than Tahitians). Chinese cultured freshwater pearls tend to be quite inexpensive in comparison. Round pearls are also more expensive than off round. High luster is much more valuable than low. Unblemished pearls are much more rare than those with surface blemishing. Matching takes huge quantities of pearls and many years to get right. And so it goes...

 

[cmd2014]

Ok, I took a look at Doyle. There are no natural pearls there. They are all cultured. But some are freshwater pearls (relatively inexpensive), some are akoya (more expensive), some are white south sea (more expensive again), and many are designer brands that carry a premium (Mikimoto), and many have a lot of gold, gemstones, and detail work that would increase the price. But some of it is also how much a particular item is wanted and by how many people. Many have been over-bid simply because someone wanted it.

If you are ever interested in buying from here, you would really need to know your pearls so that you'd have a sense of fair market value.

 

[Pearlescence]

As with everything price is what someone is willing to pay.

 

[Anne111]

Uh, uh, that sounds like another as-complicated-as-ruby type of gemstone. Thanks for the overview. Sooo much to learn.

 

[NacreLover]

I would like to know what the answer is to this question also. I see wild pearls for sale on websites and the price points are all over the place. The other problem is sellers who say they are selling natural but are really just selling genuine cultured and are calling them natural, Keshi they are calling natural too.

These natural strands are out there to happen upon it you're lucky. A lady just found one at a thrift store. It's for sale on ebay now after a trip to the GIA to be xrayed.