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November 2008
 In our newsletter this month:
Gemstone Videos
New Content at GemSelect
New and Interesting Gemstones
Rare and Unusual Gems
Customer Questions
Gemstone Videos
Unless you happen to live in Chanthaburi, Thailand or Jaipur, India, the best prices on quality gemstones are only found online. You'll not only find the best prices, but the widest selection as well. The only tricky part is that you have to make your selections based on photographs. And that can be a challenge.
Our high quality gemstone photos have always been a distinguishing feature of our website. We photograph each and every gemstone we sell -- not a simple task when we have more than 10,000 gems in stock. We also shoot each gem from 3 different angles, so you can get a good sense of the cut and proportions.
One of the virtues of still photos is that they can provide a lot of information. A still camera with a macro lens can get very close to the subject, so that very fine details can be seen. A good gemstone photo can be almost as detailed as looking at a stone under 10x magnification with a jeweler's loupe.
 But still photos have their limits. It's hard to capture the brilliance and luster of a gemstone in a still photograph. Gems reflect light best when they are moving. Many gems are pleochroic and display different colors from different angles. The multiple colors of tourmaline in particular are tough to capture with a still camera.
For a long time we've wanted to include video clips on our website to give our customers a more true-to-life experience of our gems. But high quality video was simply too slow for the internet and we didn't want to lower our quality standards or slow down our website. Now recent innovations in video compression, combined with faster internet connections, are making it practical for us. Starting this month you will start to find video clips on our gem detail pages.
If you have the industry-standard Adobe Flash Player installed, you'll see a video window when you visit a gem detail page that has a video clip. Just click the start button to play the video. If you don't have Flash installed, our detail pages will show you our still photos. If a video is available, you'll see a "Play Video" button. Click on it and you'll have the option to install the Flash player. Or you can just click here to install Flash.
We'll not only be shooting video for many of our new gems, but we'll also be adding videos for selected items in our current inventory. We're still perfecting our video production. |
| 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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New Content at GemSelect
We add hundreds of new gems to our inventory every day. But we also add new content to our website every month, in the form of articles and reference material.
Recently we've added new articles on topics ranging from seeing gemstone stars to identifying country of origin, gems from Pakistan and rocks as gems . If you've wondered why you don't see Kashmir sapphire in the market read our new article on the most famous sapphires in the world . Click the link to see all our gemstone articles.
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Rare and Unusual Gems
Each month we feature a rare and unusual gem from our inventory. This month we feature a rare green zircon from Sri Lanka.
Natural zircon is typically golden brown to orange or reddish brown. Blue and white zircon are produced by heat treatment. But the rare green zircon is a special case. The green color occurs naturally, but only in a few places in the world, principally Sri Lanka and Burma. In some zircons, radioactive uranium and thorium cause a partial disruption of the crystal lattice. Most of these so-called metamict zircon are not clean enough to be cut as gemstones. But some green specimens are an exception, and are highly prized by collectors. This 3.64 carat zircon from Sri Lanka displays a strong, slightly yellowish, green with good clarity and excellent luster.
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: |
I noticed you have some really interesting bloodstone on your website, with a lot more color in it than I usually see. Can you provide some more information about these stones? BW, USA |
| A: |
We recently bought some bloodstone rough stone from Madagascar and have been cutting it in our own shop. The rough material has a high iron oxide content, and that's why this bloodstone displays a lot of red. Some pieces have yellow and white spots as well. Our cutters have turned out some impressive pieces, including some faceted stones that you will rarely find. |
| Q: |
Do you have a printed catalogue? I would appreciate if you would send me a copy. Thank you. JSR, Indonesia |
| A: |
Almost all our gemstones are one-of-a-kind, and our stock is constantly changing. So that makes it impossible for us to have a printed catalog that is current and complete. But our website is actually an electronic catalog. All of the gems shown online are in stock and ready for delivery, and gems are removed from the website as soon as they are sold. You can search our website not only by gem type, but also by color, size, shape, weight, price and even country of origin. You can't do that with a printed catalog! |
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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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