What Ever Happened to Pearl Necklaces?

This blog post is in collaboration with Nakturnal and contains affiliate links.

When I was younger I remember loving my grandma’s costume jewelry. Back then, of course, I thought it was all real jewels and pearls. I mean I had seen my grandma wearing her cherished pearl necklace on special trips and holidays but never realized it was any different from what she gave me to wear. Looking back though of course, she was not going to give a little kid an expensive necklace to play with or wear.

Then when I had my own daughter she too went through a costume jewelry phase. I actually hit up my local thrift shop and got a whole jar of various necklaces and clip-on earrings for just a few dollars. My daughter was thrilled and even at age 8, she still wears some of those pieces and I could care less that she lost the rest of it because it was cheap.

The other day I was looking at my wedding album while cleaning my office and I was remembering how excited I got because I was given my great-grandma’s good pearl necklace that day to wear as my something old. I say “good” because she actually wrote that on the box probably so she didn’t mix them up with fake ones – which wouldn’t be hard to do because honestly, I cannot tell the difference. Since I am obsessed with Wikipedia, I did look up pearls and the difference and I read “imitation pearls look the part, they do not have the same weight or smoothness as real pearls, and their luster will also dim greatly.” Still though from looking at them it is hard to tell the difference between real and fake.

So whatever happened to cherished jewelry that was worn only on special occasions and passed down?

I look at my pitiful jewelry collection and really I have nothing special other than my wedding rings and my great-grandma’s necklace. Are we doing a disservice to our daughters today by not having jewelry for special occasions or to pass down? I also used to think pearl necklaces were super expensive but I found some pretty reasonable and even in different colors on Amazon. I think I need to step up my jewelry game and show my daughter that it is fun to still dress up and wear special things for special occasions.