November Newsletter 2022

While Thanksgiving is not traditionally celebrated here in Thailand, we want to wish all our American customers a Happy Thanksgiving for the upcoming holiday.

Amazing Fossicking Find

Matt Betteridge is an amateur prospector that lives on fossicking land near Rubyvale in Queensland. He made a spectacular find recently when he found a huge 834 carat Australian sapphire after a recent rainfall. Mr Betteridge will keep the sapphire (worth well over $10,000) as a specimen for now but has not ruled out the possibility to cut the stone for jewelry later on. As a result of Mr Betteridge luck, gem hunters are out in force hoping to find similar lucrative gemstones.

The Fortune Pink Diamond

An absolutely breathtaking 18.18 ct vivid pink diamond dubbed ‘The Fortune Pink’ will go under the hammer at the Geneva Magnificent Jewels sale on Nov 8, 2022. It is estimated to fetch close to $50 million!

Pink diamonds are extraordinarily rare and usually out of price range for us mere mortals. There is however a range of beautiful stones in hot pink colors that won't break the bank! Check out our guide to Six Sizzling Hot Pink Gems here.

Phenomenal Gemstones

I often forget how lucky I am to be around literally thousands of rare, beautiful gemstones on a daily basis. One of my favorite types of gems is the star gemstones. Star or, more properly, asterism is a term used for gemstones which display a star-like shape that can appear to float across their surface. In most cases, the star effect is the result of tiny inclusions of the mineral rutile within the gemstone which are aligned in parallel lines. With great skill, cutters have to turn the gemstones to just the right angle before shaping and polishing to ensure they have a clear and distinct star. Typically the star will have 4 or 6 rays but on very rare occasions 12 rays can be seen. You might have heard of star rubies and star sapphires, but there are also a number of other gem types that exhibit the star phenomena including moonstone, diopside, garnet and quartz.

November Birthstone

There are two birthstones for November - Citrine and Topaz. Once upon a time, citrine and topaz (as well as many other pale yellow stones) were often mistaken for each other and were quite interchangeable as gemstones before scientists could properly identify them as two completely different minerals. Since just about all pale yellow gemstones were called Topaz no matter what they were in reality it makes sense to link both these autumnal colored stones to the month of November.

Customer Questions and Answers:

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Happy Gemstone Hunting!

Team GemSelect