uuuhhh..... i gave this some thought and now brain hurts...
lol...
ivory i love almost every piece i have seen.i used to prefer a nice clean piece of ivory
but now i prefer a nice bark ivory with checks,craks,diffrent shades.
the more undefined,the better.
i will say if you love stag and arent a pearl fan becuase of how clean it is
then give a nice piece of bark ivory a try.im sure most would agree.
although their are huge differences in ivory normally the differences are like that in bone or stag.different shades and texture etc etc. with pearl its either fiery,semi fiery or dull.
{not talking about BLP,GLP,PLP }
what is firey pearl? IMO its when its in your hand and rainbows are just spilling
out all over the place with just the natural movement of using the knife.
i would say maybe 10% of all pearl cuts fall into this group.
literally looks like a jewel of sorts.
what is semi fiery pearl? about 70% of all pearl IMO falls into this catergory.
has great fire and maybe even a little that gives it that jewel look but most rainbows are noticed only by handling under light,turning and twisting the knife around to see the rainbow/prizm effect.
dull pearl? dull pearl is just that dull. either a spark of rainbow or none at all.
a vintage knife easily can have dull pearl but it may not be dull underbeath dirt and so forth.vintage pearl if it was fiery at one point, if cleaned right,
you can regain back alot of that fire.
also like most things cheap cuts of pearl are normally dull?
MOP is also the hardest material for me to photograph properly.
poor pictures is also IMO why pearl is one of the hardest things to buy online.
what i have yet to see is JIGGED PEARL with any fire to it.
if you own anything with jigged pearl and its firey please post it or let me know.
long as usual

but hope this helps a newcomer or something.
