Different shades of white and pink are the natural colours of freshwater pearls. The white ones can be anything from pure white to ivory white, and the pink ones can be anything from different shades of coral pink to lilac.

All other colours are artificial, dyed manually. One way to do this is to put the naturally coloured pearl into a “cocktail” of pigments, which, together with ultraviolet light, dyes the pearl straight through the core. This process takes about a month.

A common colour among dyed pearls is Peacock, which has different shimmering shades of blue, purple and green, just like the feathers of a peacock.