In 1915, the house of Cartier made history when it presented a double strand of natural pearls for $1.2 million, by far the highest price for any pearls and perhaps any single piece of jewelry. New York socialite Maisie Plant was so enamored by the pearls that she traded her Fifth Avenue mansion for the necklace. It was a wise barter for Cartier, which established its U.S. flagship store in the Neo-Renaissance townhouse, but not for New York’s grande dame. When cultivated pearls were perfected in the 1940s, the demand for natural pearls plummeted. Her necklace sold at a Parke Bernet auction in 1957 for a mere $150,000.
 If only Plant’s heirs had held on to the necklace for a few more decades. A similar natural double-strand sold at Christie’s in Geneva for $3.1 million last November, an astonishing world-record price for a string of pearls. Today, fine natural pearls are once again coveted treasures.
“These pearls are among the rare wonders of the world,” says Rahul Kadakia, head of Christie’s jewelry department in the Americas, referring to the record-breaking necklace. He believes its components originated off the coast of Bahrain, the source of many historically important pearls. However, those precious oyster beds deteriorated decades ago from overfishing, pollution and oil drilling. “Fine quality natural pearls always command top dollar because they are scarce, and there is nothing man can do about it,” Kadakia says.
For every 25,000 wild oysters found in the ocean, only one gem-quality pearl is uncovered, according to gemologist and writer Antoinette Matlins, author of The Pearl Book. Today most pearls, including the finest South Sea and Tahitian varieties, are cultured. Fine examples of these can command upward of $100,000 per strand because farming the delicate mollusks in pristine waters is an expensive business that often fails to pay off.
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