Pearl Dyes

A friend asked me about colouring of the pearls the other day so I thought I'd share on my blog about dyeing of pearl jewellery. This is a rather complicated topic as there are many ways to either nurture cultured pearls with colour tones or dyeing them after they are "born". I'll outline the simple basics here quickly for you:

There are three types of pearl colours that can be nurtured within oysters: white, lilac pink and purple. Other colours such as green, blue, chocolate, yellow etc. are achieve through "feeding" colours to oysters while they are growing pearls, so that the colour is fully integrated into the pearl layers. Coloured pearls, as long as authentic, can also pass the "scratching" test without losing any colour. (Scratching test is where you scratch the surface of a pearl with a sharp object to create a trace of powder; after wiping away the powder an authentic pearl's surface will stay as if untouched).

Carla Pearls offer an range of pearl jewellery that are either with natural, nurtured or dyed colour pearls. Dyeing does not affect the pearl's quality rating.