Archive for January, 2010
Saturday, January 30th, 2010
As we mentioned in our recent blog, we're always excited to see the latest gem finds displayed at the upcoming Tucson gem shows. In recent decades Africa has been the biggest producer of wonderful new gemstones and gem materials. The heavily mineralized Great Rift valley along the eastern side of the continent was one of […]
Tags: Amelia Courthouse, Fanta, Great Rift Valley, Kenya, Mandarin, Merelani, Namibia, Nigerian, Ramona, Spessart, spessartine garnet, Tanzanite, Tsavo, tsavorite
Posted in Gemstones, Jewelry Facts, Mardon Happenings | Comments Off on A New Star– the Spessartine Garnets
Thursday, January 28th, 2010
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 fiancĂ© – it has been a pleasure to do business […]
Tags: Burma ruby, gemstone brokering, pigeon's blood ruby
Posted in Gemstones, Jewelry Services | Comments Off on A Quest for the Perfect Ruby-The Rest of the Story
Wednesday, January 27th, 2010
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 […]
Tags: Deer Creek, fire agate, garnet, kashmir sapphire, moonstone, padparadscha sapphire, pigeon's blood ruby, spinel, Tucson Gem and Mineral Show
Posted in Gem Industry News, Gemstones, Jewelry Facts, Jewelry Services, Mardon Happenings | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, January 12th, 2010
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 […]
Tags: Burma ruby, gem broker, GIA, GRS, pigeon's blood ruby, Tom Lantos Act, unheated ruby
Posted in Custom Jewelry, Gemstones, Jewelry Services, Mardon Happenings | Comments Off on A Seinfeld Holiday, Episode 2
Saturday, January 9th, 2010
True Story- One of our local police officers stopped by early this week with this group of assorted gold items she owned and wanted to sell– jewelry she no longer wore, broken pieces, etc. We sat down, I examined her gold for karat content and weighed it up. Our offer for the lot that day […]
Tags: appraisals, cash4gold, gold parties, scrap gold calculator
Posted in Gem Industry News, Jewelry Facts, Jewelry Services, Mardon Happenings | Comments Off on Gold Parties Pay Cheap Prices for Gold
Saturday, January 2nd, 2010
Yes, they are all garnets. The January birthstone is usually thought of as a dark red gemstone, but like the sapphire, garnet occurs in colors we don’t expect to see. In fact, garnets can be purple, red, orange, yellow, colorless or green, almost all the colors but true blue. There is even a garnet that […]
Tags: almandine, color change garnet, garnet, grossular, pyrope, spessartine
Posted in Gemstones, Jewelry Facts | Comments Off on The Natural Colors of Garnet