We always love the stories that go along with our jewelry, especially the ones about the special engagement or wedding rings of our customers. I just received this picture via email from a client in London, England, showing the magnificent ruby his bride is now wearing.

Our very discriminating groom required a 2 carat unheated Burma ruby of pigeon’s blood red and had exhausted his contacts in London. He found us through the internet where he read our 3 part series of articles about Pigeon’s Blood Ruby.

After an arduous 3 month search, during which we had to juggle customs regulations, distant vendors, international travelers, and multiple time zones, we found the perfect stone for this couple. You can read about the funny and exciting search for this beautiful ruby in the two articles we posted, A Seinfeld Holiday, Episode 2 and A Quest for the Perfect Ruby.

In true European style, where the center is a colored gemstone rather than a diamond, this ruby is set in the very popular halo style, reminiscent of the ring Princess Kate is now wearing. Our bride’s ring is distinguished by the micro-pave diamonds along the sides of the ring that lead up to the center circlet of gems.

At Mardon, we think colored gems are the perfect way to express the love and commitment of the engagement. The lasting durability of ruby along with it’s passionate color means this ultra rare and unique gemstone will highlight their marriage, gathering attention and comment in the years to come. Look for our upcoming series of posts about the beautiful colored gemstone engagement rings we’ve created.

2 ct. Unheated Pigeon's Blood Ruby

Relating to our recent post about our quest for an unheated Pigeon’s Blood ruby entitled “A Seinfeld Holiday, Episode 2″ , we just received this very nice testimonial.

“Jim, thank you for your hard work and dedication in finding the perfect engagement stone for my fiancé – it has been a pleasure to do business with you over the last three months. Your professionalism and expertise stood out far in advance of the many other jewellers and dealers I have dealt with since I started looking for this unique gem. I had spent more than two months looking for such a stone before I found your website – I had previously spoken to some of London’s most prestigious jewellers and gem dealers with no luck. Your patience in helping us understand what we were really looking for and your consistent willingness to go the extra mile even when things got complicated were both greatly appreciated. We are both extremely happy with the purchase and we will treasure it forever. Thank you!”

Our Gemstone Brokering services consist of locating and facilitating the purchase of fine gemstones–and, as you can see from our story,  we are able to do business internationally. Give us a call or contact us by email if you are looking for an exceptional gem– we specialize in exceptional!

Every year for the first two weeks in February, gem dealers and buyers from all over the world converge on the small desert city of Tucson, Arizona. The annual Tucson event has become the Mecca of colored stones, fossils and gem minerals where dealers display such sophisticated and extremely valuable gems like this matched suite of Imperial Jade– valued at over 100,000 dollars

to exotic and rare objects of interest–some of the dealers from Russia have been known to display complete fossil mammoth skeletons. Museum quality gems and objects abound. The work of award winning designers, jewelry makers, sculptors and gem cutters are featured at the top shows. The latest technologies are showcased. Buyers also can see truckloads of mineral, gem and fossil raw materials, table after table of beads and pearls, and tribal art and objets d’ art from all over the world. The variety and quantity of goods are truly astounding.

The original show, the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show, still going strong after 56 years, was for serious and not so serious mineral collectors and attracted rock hounds and lapidary dealers from all over the USA. Other shows have sprung up like mushrooms to occupy almost every hotel, motel, and open lot in the city. Because the high value of some of the merchandise creates real security concerns, the best shows are open only to bonafide members of the jewelry trade.

Tucson provides a stage for dealers to introduce exciting new gem finds and treasures–in recent years, South America, Africa and Central Asia have been the stars of the shows. Tucson is also the marketplace where prices of colored gemstones are compared and pretty much set for the coming year.

This year we’ll be looking to reestablish our connections with some of the fire agate miners in Arizona. Fire agate has long been a favorite, and my new ring has attracted a lot of attention. Early in my career, I published an article in the GIA journal, Gems and Gemology, Spring issue, 1979 entitled “Fire Agates of Deer Creek”

Deer Creek Fire Agate in 18K Gold

Other favorites we will look for include fine turquoise, the garnet family, spinels, moonstones, and of course opals. And of course, we’ll see fabulous things we’ve never seen before! Look for some great new pieces later this year.

Your intrepid treasure hunters, Kaye and Jim, will be attending to buy, mingle and just plain ogle. but we also shop for clients. In past years, we have located many fine stones at the Tucson Show, including the exquisite gems shown below. Besides the thrill of acquiring truly special treasures, our clients enjoyed participating in designing a truly wonderful jewel.

Here is a wonderful 4 ct. Padaparadscha sapphire and the custom ring a loving husband designed, with our assistance.

And here is a fabulous Pigeon’s Blood ruby, and the ring in which it now resides.

We also uncover exquisite estate items at Tucson, like this wonderful Kashmir sapphire ring from the 20′s.

Our extensive network of contacts and close relationships with many of the best dealers at Tucson, along with our expertise, taste, and keen eye are at your service. As members of the American Gem Trade Association, we have privileges at the best shows with the best dealers. Please give us a call if you are looking and haven’t found the gem of your dreams–the treasure trove we’ll see in Tucson holds the one you’ve been looking for.

Fine Burma Rubies, Loose and Mounted

As promised, here’s a story that should get some chuckles– it’s an episode that turned out to be a long and winding road, so typical of the gemstone and jewelry business.

Several months ago, I was contacted by a gentleman residing in London, England. He was impressed by my series of blogs about Pigeon’s Blood Rubies and wanted to know if I could help him find an unheated ruby from Burma that would qualify as “pigeon’s blood” color. The gem would be used as the center of an engagement ring.

We offer gem brokering services for high end gemstones, so even though this person was overseas, I decided to give it a try– we are always looking to innovate and build our business, so why not go for the global market!

Right off, we knew it would be a real challenge for three big reasons. First, importing Burma rubies and jade is severely limited in the USA by the Tom Lantos Act, a well intentioned law intended to punish the current government/junta of Myanmar/Burma for among other things, its dismal record on human rights.

Of course, the law of unintended consequences applies– the junta is doing just fine, still raping the country of its treasure and oppressing its people, while many of the miners, gem cutters, dealers and jewelers of Burma and neighboring Thailand who were able to eke out a living from this natural resource have had to go back to work in the rice fields.

We are still allowed to work with Burma rubies imported into the US prior to the enactment of the Lantos Act, Sept. 28, 2009, and to export Burma rubies from the US. The type of stones we work with normally have laboratory documentation that shows their presence in the country prior to the embargo, so I figured we had that problem solved. As I was to learn later, silly me!

Next, our client’s criteria really limited the choices available. He wanted a round unheated “pigeon’s blood red” stone from Burma, 1 1/2 to 2 carats. Of course, the current embargo has severely limited the supply of Burma goods. Most rubies are cut into ovals and most are heated to enhance clarity and color. And, rubies from 1 1/2 carats up are quite rare.

He was firm about no heat, Burma origin and pigeon’s blood color, so my first bit of expert advice was to expand the parameters and at least consider other shapes, so as not to limit his choices for this ultra rare gem.

The next issue was to solve the price question. I knew his budget was at the low end of the market for good to fine unheated Burma rubies, but wanted to see if we could meet the challenge. We work with a small group of elite gem dealers who can supply high quality gems–from a previous sale, I had a general idea of the market and knew this call would be tough.

We contacted our ruby specialists and were able to locate a number of unheated Burma rubies in the general shape and size range, but even with our very modest brokering commission, most were out of his price range. Being British, he had to research the idiom “sticker shock” when I told him what most stones were selling for in his category.

After much research, I was able to find several excellent stones, loose and mounted that would fit most of his criteria– see the picture at the beginning of this article– the two loose stones in that photo, left and center are shown below.

These two unheated Burma rubies were very close to the size and shape he preferred, fit his budget, were of fine “pigeon’s blood” color, and were documented “no evidence of heat treatment,” the left one by GIA, the other by the Swiss GRS lab.  The two stones were within .o4 ct of each other, but the left one, cut a bit deeper, is more brilliant and of better color even though it faced up smaller. I much preferred the smaller looking stone because of its vivid color and good cut– typical for a gemologist.

My client was delighted with the choices I presented to him. He chose to see the two loose ones and agreed to buy, intimating that he would probably buy both–it had been such a struggle for him to find good stones that would meet his criteria and he had plans for the second stone. Yay!

Now the fun began. The problem was not only how to get these expensive gems to London, but also how to allow my client to see the gems before he paid for them. We didn’t expect him to buy ” a pig in the poke!” but we had to make sure our firm was protected as well.

We have an account with a specialty company that acts as a courier for the jewelry trade, specializing in transporting high value shipments both nationally and internationally. As part of their services, they have offices around the world where such shipments can be viewed for approval in a secure environment. The recipient/consignee examines the package in the presence of the courier staff– if he likes the goods, he pays the shipper who then instructs the courier to release the goods to the consignee.

It was the perfect solution– the courier had an office in London that was only a few blocks from where my client worked– all we had to do was to pay for the service!

Here is where the twists and turns in the road really began.

First twist– Because of the Lantos embargo, we had to document the origin and date of import of the rubies into the US– so long as they were in this country before the embargo went into effect, it is legal to ship them. We had lab documents that proved these stones to be exempt from the embargo, so we filled out the appropriate export/import forms. No Problemo!

Our shipper was impressed with the amount and quality of documentation we provided. Even with all the issues surrounding Burma rubies, because we were in compliance with the law, they assured us there would be no problem. Into the package they went, off to London.

Bump in the road #2–The next day, the courier rep. called me and said the package had arrived at the London office and had been rejected– their explanation was that a new customs regulation had just been put into effect in Britain that prohibited the import of Burma rubies into the United Kingdom. The Los Angeles office knew nothing about this new regulation and were just as surprised as we were. The package was being returned, after having been a few hundred yards from my client!

We asked the courier to hold the stones till we figured out something–my client still wanted the stones. We worked on alternate solutions over the next few days. Emails flew back and forth–His fiance would be visiting family in Washington DC shortly after Christmas–could she view the stones in DC? No, but the closest office was Manhattan–could she fly or drive to New York? Yes, that would work, she would be available the week after Christmas.

Long and short, we sent the stones to the New York office, consigned to the fiance– all she had to do was show up, provide identification, view the stones, and call us with a credit card to buy the stones. Once we had approval of the charge, we would instruct the courier to release the stones to her.

Twist #3– The morning the viewing was scheduled, we get a phone call from the client– he’s in New York, would like to view the stones, but because the package was consigned to his fiance (per his instructions), the courier wouldn’t allow him access, could we do something about it? A couple of hurried calls to the Los Angeles office, emailing specific instructions and waivers, the client is allowed into the viewing room.

Turn #4– My client calls, loves the stones, but had decided to purchase one stone, not both.  A disappointment but not a surprise– glad to sell something in these hard times, so we would ring it up and release his stone.

Bump #5–Based on prior experience with large payments via credit cards, we had previously advised the client to make sure his bank was aware of the impending charge, so it would clear when we input the transaction. Sure enough, when we run the charge thru our credit card system, it is declined.

Our frustrated client, not to be denied, calls his bank in England, reads them the riot act, and tells us to try again. With the help of a customer service person from our credit card processor and the perseverance of my wife Kaye, the charge goes through, so all I have to do is instruct the courier to give the chosen stone to my client.

Twist #6– The courier informs me that they can only deliver the entire package or return the package to me. Under their business model, they aren’t allowed to open a package themselves– they can’t give him the one stone he wants. All or nothing!

The finish line–My client and I worked out a creative solution (which I won’t disclose) and all’s well that ends well. My client and fiance are happily back in England. We referred them to the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths for a good local goldsmith who can make their ring. We hope to see photo’s of the finished work and of course, of the wedding.  We’ll post these as soon they’re available.

The moral of the story is that we at Mardon go the extra mile for our clients. Our gemological credentials and many years of experience buying and selling colored gemstones and diamonds, our extensive network of contacts within the gem industry, and our commitment to doing the job the right way are our commercial capital. In today’s difficult economy, hard assets like rare gems are appreciating strongly as investors look to protect the value of their dollars. Give us a call or email if you are seriously looking for the exotic, the unusual, the rare gemstone.