Mother of Pearl Buttons are made from the raw material with scientific name, PINCTADA MAXIMA. They are harvested in coastal regions like Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Philippines, Australia …. The tidal regions provide the natural habitat for the shell animal to nourish and mature before being harvested by the shell farmers.
As the Mother of Pearl are the nacre coating formed inside the inner shell of the species, they are fabulous, iridescent and glow in a faint, attractive sheen. As a result, Mother of Pearl MOP has been the most sought after material for making shirt buttons.
Since Mother of Pearl Buttons so made has many of the desirable factors for enhancing a beautifully, hand-made custom dress shirts, it has become a traditional to match bespoke shirts with mother of pearl buttons. This is unmatchable by their plastic counterparts. MOP comes in natural as white and smoke, other colors such as pink, navy, brown, yellow, light blue, grey … can be dyed-to-match to give brilliant colors.
Great Shirts need great mother of pearl buttons, don’t spare for the cheap!
Quick links; Logo-engraved Polyester Shirt Buttons | Dyed Pearl Shirt Buttons | Mother of Pearl Collar Stays | Agoya Shell Buttons | Mother of Pearl Suit Buttons – Smoke |
- As mother of pearl buttons are second to none, they are essential for all discerning gentlemen who care for their high end bespoke custom shirts
- Great match for bespoke and custom made shirts
- Iridescent, lustrous with a glowing sheen, unmatchable by their plastic counterparts
- Ultimate choice!
- For plain without engraving mother of pearl buttons, we have normal round rim ones as shown on left 1st photo
Real thick mother of pearl
- A Variety of Thickness
- Various thickness – 2mm, 2.4mm, 3mm, 4mm
- The thicker the buttons, the stronger they are and the more deluxe they are
Customized buttons with engraving
- Normal engraving is with Broad rim custom logo-engraved MOP Shirt Buttons (as shown on left 2nd photo)
- Customers can now have their initials and name engraved exclusively on the buttons
- Personalized unique buttons for satisfied customers
- Turnaround time for engraving order is about 3 weeks before dispatching
Other more stylish shapes
- Besides the above standard broad rim shapes, we have also:
- Concave Shaped MOP Shirt Buttons (3rd photo left) – a little shallow valley on the top of the buttons
- Bevel Shaped MOP Shirt Buttons (4th photo left) – a slanting rim round the edge
- Flat Top and Bottom MOP Shirt Buttons (5th photo left)
Size of shirt buttons
- First of all, there are 3 sizes of Mother of Pearl buttons that a shirt may need – 14L, 16L, 18L
- 14L is for the button down collar – you may only need 2 at most for a shirt or none at all
- 16L is for the neck and cuffs – need 3 or a spare
- 18L is for the front of the shirts – you may need up to 10 pieces including spare buttons in general
- As a tip for selection, for button as thick as 4mm, you may prefer size 16L than 18L for the front of the shirt as this size can fit more easily into the buttonhole. So you may need size 16L rather than 18L for your 4mm thickness exceptionally!
- Also, for size 14L, some customers may prefer a thinner version than those they use for 16L and 18L, as the button down button needs not be too thick. So, match 3mm thickness of 16L and 18L with the 2mm thickness 14L buttons. Of course, these are totally suggestion and may vary from customer to customer.
Care instructions for MOP Buttons
- Most importantly, Mother of Pearl Buttons desire good treatment in the laundry or dry-cleaning as chemicals can drastically damage the texture of the buttons
- Be gentle to the buttons!
- Better to hand wash the shirts rather machine wash
- It may be desirable to cover the buttons with aluminum foil in addition to some paddings between the button and the foil before washing. This will reduce the harmful effect of the chemicals during laundry. Also to preserve the charm of the radiant glow of the buttons
- For serious enthusiast, you may undo the stitching of the buttons before washing!
- For more information about the MOP Material, see Nacre from Wikipedia at here