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 February 2009
In our newsletter this month:
Pink Gemstones
New and Interesting Gemstones
Rare and Unusual Gems
Customer Questions
Pink Gemstones
We sell about 100 different varieties of gemstones and we've learned from experience that it's impossible to predict what varieties people will want to buy at any given time. So we try to keep an extensive inventory with well over 10,000 gems in stock.
But if we can't predict what types of stones our customers want, one thing we've learned is that pink gems are always in demand. Pink is a color that has long been associated with love and with femininity, but also with good health and happiness, as in the English idiom in the pink. The brighter pinks are youthful and exciting, while the vibrant pinks are as sensual and passionate as red. The soft and delicate pinks are romantic and innocent.
So what are your choices in pink gemstones? The rarest are pink diamonds, usually selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars per carat. Fine pink sapphire is much less expensive, though pink is actually one of the rarest sapphire colors. Pink sapphire is usually found only in smaller sizes and finding a clean stone can be difficult. Pink spinel is an excellent substitute, since it's easier to find larger pieces with excellent clarity. Don't forget to look at ruby as well, since many rubies occur in pink-red. Pink, after all, is just a desaturated red.
Tourmaline is undoubtedly the gemstone most associated with the color pink. If you're looking for a really saturated pink -- such as hot pink or a vibrant red pink -- you're mostly likely to find it in a pink tourmaline. You'll also find the widest range of pink hues in tourmaline, from pastel pink to rose to pink violet. You'll also find interesting multicolor pieces including the distinctive watermelon tourmaline.
The pale pink gems kunzite and morganite have a different attraction. Their delicate color and excellent clarity is displayed to best advantage when finely cut. Kunzite occurs in pale pink to lilac hues, while morganite tends more to the salmon pink or orange pink. Both have good hardness and the lighter tones display good brilliance. Kunzite, the pink form of spodumene, can often be found in larger sizes as well. Morganite is a rare pink beryl, belonging to the same family as emerald and aquamarine. It is typically found mainly in smaller sizes but with excellent clarity.
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| New and Interesting Gems -- updated November 9th |
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Watermelon Tourmaline from Nigeria: Watermelon tourmaline is one of the most distinctive gems in the world. We have just purchased a small number of exquisite pieces from Nigerian with outstanding color and clarity. These are the finest we've seen this year. |
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Boulder Opal from Australia: Boulder Opal is the second most prized form of opal, after black opal. The name derives from the fact that this opal is found embedded in ironstone boulders. Boulder opal is especially attractive because, like the black opal, it has a dark body tone which adds vibrancy to the play of color. We've just purchased a small lot of excellent pieces, in sizes between 4 and 15 carats. |
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Clinohumite from Tanzania: Clinohumite is a rare mineral. It is a member of the humite group of minerals, which includes humite, clinohumite, chondrodite, and norbergite. Only three sources of gem-quality clinohumite are known: the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan, the Taymyr region of northern Siberia and the Mahenge plateau of Tanzania. Usually clinohumite is found in sizes under 1 carat but we just have acquired a small number of new pieces from Tajikistan in the 2-3 carat size. |
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Huge Topaz from Brazil: Gem-quality minerals are sometimes found in exceptionally large sizes. We've acquired some natural topaz from Brazil in sizes between 360 and 507 carats. We currently have 4 pieces in a light champagne color with outstanding clarity (all of been graded IF). Collectors take note. |
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Fluorite from Namibia: Fluorite is said to be the most colorful mineral in the world. We've just bought a new stock of some very colorful pieces, including electric greens and blues and some fascinating multicolor pieces. Most of the new pieces are in the 10 to 45 carat size, with a few larger stones, all with excellent clarity. We've recently added some very colorful cabochons as well. |
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Color-Change Diaspore from Turkey: Diaspore, sometimes marketed under the name Zultanite, is a color change gem from Turkey recently introduced to the international market. Under natural or fluorescent light, Diapsore has a kiwi green color, with flashes of yellow. Diaspore displays a champagne color under incandescent lighting, and when exposed to subdued lighting, such as candlelight, has a pinkish hue. We've recently bought a substantial number of new pieces, with a good choice of cuts and sizes. |
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Snowflake Obsidian from Mexico: Obsidian is a naturally occurring volcanic glass. It is formed when felsic lava extruded from a volcano cools without crystal growth.In some stones, the inclusion of small, white, radially clustered crystals of cristobalite in the black glass produce a blotchy or snowflake pattern, and this is known in the gem trade as snowflake obsidian. |
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Unheated Sapphire from Tanzania, Madagascar and Thailand: Our unheated sapphires have been very popular and we continue to increase our stock (now over 700 pieces). For the discriminating gem buyer who will accept nothing less than 100% natural, you'll find pink, blue, green, yellow and violet pieces, all guaranteed to be unheated. You may be surprised how affordable these are in the smaller sizes. |
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Seraphinite from Russia: Seraphinite is a trade name for a particular form of clinochlore, a member of the chlorite group. The dark green color of seraphinite is enhanced by a silvery and feathery shimmer caused by mica inclusions. Seraphinite was named for the seraphim, the highest order of angels, because of the feather-like appearance of the chatoyant fibers in the stone. This fascinating gemstone is a new addition our inventory. |
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Top Grade Amethyst from Brazil: We've just acquired some top grade natural amethyst from Brazil in very large sizes, ranging from about 20 to 75 carats. These are all VVS or IF clarity in the richest purple we've seen in amethyst in a long time. If you've been looking for a very special piece of amethyst, you'll want to check these out. |
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Demantoid Garnet from Namibia: Demantoid is the rarest and most valuable of the garnets, and is one of the most difficult to find of all colored gems. It is one of the few colored gemstones with a luster and brilliance similar to diamond. We have built up a stock of more than 100 pieces of Namibian demantoid, including some very fine matched pairs. |
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Amber from Poland: Amber is the fossilized hardened resin of the pine tree, Pinus succinifera, formed mainly in the Eocene epoch of the Tertiary period, about 50 million years ago. Amber has been used since prehistoric times for jewelry, amulets and religious objects. The most prized pieces contain inclusions of insects or plants or pyrites. Most amber is found in the Baltic region. We buy amber just a few times a year from our source in Poland and we've just added a new stock. |
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Turquoise from Afghanistan: Turquoise has been known and valued for thousands of years. We've bought some new pieces from Afghanistan, in an interesting variety of blue and blue-green hues. We've also found some of the popular apple-green turquoise that we first carried last year, and some superb matched pairs in blue. |
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Huge Star Rose Quartz from South Africa: We carry many large gemstones, but none as large as these Star Rose Quartz. We've collected 9 pieces over 100 carats, with the largest weighing in at an amazing 974 carats. The star effect in rose quartz is unusual in any size, but quite rare in these very large stones. |
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Axinite from Tanzania: Axinite is a group of brown to violet-brown or reddish brown minerals that sometimes occur in gem quality. Axinite is distinctive for its strong vitreous luster when polished, and its interesting pyro- and piezo-electric properties. Axinite is also popular with mineral collectors due to its unusual crystal structure. We have found a small stock of golden brown Axinite from Tanzania. |
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Spinel from Burma: We buy fine spinel whenever we can find it, and we've recently added some very fine pieces of Burmese spinel. You'll find red, violet, orange, blue and gray in a variety of shapes and sizes, including a good selection of pairs and lots. |
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Blue Sapphire from Madagascar, Ceylon and Tanzania: One of the most classic of all colored gemstones, the blue sapphire is always fashionable. This brilliant and hard-wearing gemstone is perfect for any kind of jewelry. We've added many new stones to our stock of more than 400 blue sapphires, including a number of excellent cornflower blue pieces. |
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Jadeite from Burma: Jade has been known and treasured for more than 7,000 years. But only in 1863 was it discovered that jade is actually not a single mineral. What was traditionally called jade is in fact two separate and distinct minerals: jadeite and nephrite. Jadeite is the rarer and more valuable jade, with the most famous deposits coming from Burma. We have verified samples of our Jadeite at the AIGS gemological lab in Bangkok. You'll find a good range of colors in these, including white, green and lavender. |
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Spessartite Garnet from Mozambique: We have added a large number of new pieces to our extensive inventory of this very popular gem. We now have over 500 pieces in stock, in mandarin and red-orange, in both cabochon and faceted. The range of sizes and quality grades is extensive. Our most recent additions are in the best mandarin orange color, mainly in smaller sizes. |
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Color-Change Garnet from Tanzania and Madagascar: We've recently found some rare Color-Change Garnet from Tanzania with a dramatic color change from greenish-brown to red pink. We have a small number of pieces, mostly eye-clean, in the 1 to 2 carat size. We've added these to our substantial stock of Color-Change Garnet from Madagascar. |
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Sphene from Sri Lanka: We have added some excellent new pieces to our stock of this rare gemstone famous for its remarkable dispersion or fire. These are bright golden and green pieces in interesting shapes and cuts, including a number of rounds in smaller sizes. Sphene tends to have inclusions, but we've found a number of eye-clean pieces. |
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Emerald from Colombia: We have just received a new stock of Colombian emeralds with rich color and good transparency. These are mainly ovals and pears in smaller sizes, ideal for earrings and ring settings. |
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Rare and Unusual Gems
Each month we feature a rare and unusual gem from our inventory. This month we feature an outstanding color change sapphire from Tanzania
Some rare sapphires exhibit a color change under varying lighting conditions. Color change sapphires are typically blue in natural light and violet or purple under incandescent indoor light. All color change sapphire are rare, but finding them in larger sizes is especially difficult. This round 4.6 carat color change sapphire from Tanzania is unusual not only for its size, but also because it is completely untreated.
Customer Questions
Every month we answer questions of general interest from our customers. Please feel free to send your questions to help@gemselect.com. |
| Q: |
Do you sell green amethyst? I don't see it on your website. Thanks for your answer. TP, Australia |
| A: |
Amethyst, by definition, is violet to purple colored quartz. So there is really no such thing as green amethyst. The gem sometimes sold as green amethyst is what gemologists call prasiolite, which is a leek-green quartz produced by heating amethyst to about 500 degrees centigrade. Unfortunately the color is known to fade when exposed to strong sunlight, so peridot would be a much better choice in this color range. You may also see green quartz in a vivid mint green or blue-green hue, but this is almost always synthetic material produced by the hydrothermal method. |
| Q: |
I've wondered, why do some gems show a color change? What causes it? |
| A: |
Color change gems have two approximately equal sized transmission windows. A blue gemstone appears blue because it absorbs all frequencies of light except for blue. A gemstone that absorbs both blue and red light will appear blue when the light is rich in blue wavelengths (e.g.,sunlight or fluorescent light) and red or purple when the light is rich in red wavelengths (e.g., incandescent light).
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| A final note -- If you send us email, please be assured that we answer all our email very promptly, 6 days a week. But we sometimes have problems with spam filters on the receiving end, so please adjust the settings on your mail client so you can receive mail from help@gemselect.com.
Happy gem hunting,
Your friends at GemSelect |
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