No longer strictly shore-bound, shell designs go upscale in fine form. Whether exotic or purely organic in style, the luminous look of shell slides into multiple settings with plenty of natural charm.

7-year-old Allie Holmes and Meghan Bresnahan (8) of Hope look for shells on the Lincolnville Beach recently. The girls met in preschool when they were 4-years-old. Bresnahan says the best thing about ...

In the 1980s, a trove of rare shells—some of which had been collected on a famed 18th-century voyager’s doomed final expedition—was tossed in a dumpster at Newcastle University in England during an ...