Mother of Pearl

Nacre, also known as mother of pearl, is an organic-inorganic composite material produced by some mollusks as an inner shell layer. It is also what makes up pearls. It is very strong and resilient.

Nacre appears iridescent because the thickness of the aragonite platelets is close to the wavelength of visible light. This results in constructive and destructive interference of different wavelengths of light, resulting in different colors of light being reflected at different viewing angles.