Iolite
The eye visible purple-violet pleochroism of iolite is often one of the first gems used to introduce gemology to beginners because of its almost magic like optical feature.
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – August 2020
Gemstones with unusual optical effects are defined as phenomenal gems. Their unusual effect can designate a variety within a species and add value.
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – July 2020
Clarity enhancement; probably the oldest gem treatment method...
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Kunzite: a rosy spodumene with an American name
Spodumene is almost exclusively a pegmatitic mineral of the pyroxene group that forms in monoclinic system with a chemical formula of LiAlSi2O6. Its hardness is 6.5 to 7 on the Mohs’ scale and displays perfect prismatic cleavage. Transparent and colored varieties show strong pleochroism. Strangely, the name spodumene means “ash-colored” in Greek referring to the dull and colorless examples when it was first named in the second half of the 19th century.
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Engraved Gems. Timeless Seals and Canvases of Ancient Scenes.
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Sphene: A Mineral Emanates Fire with Two Names.
Titanite, as it is known to modern mineralogists for its significant titanium content, was first recognized as a new mineral by the great German chemist Martin Heinrich Klaproth in 1795. Soon after its discovery, in 1801, the wedge-shaped crystals inspired the mineralogist Rene Just Haüy, the name bearer of mineral hauyne, to introduce the name “Sphene” after “sphenos,” meaning wedge in Greek.
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – March 2020
The fascination of deep blue matrix speckled with golden colored pyrite flecks of lapis lazuli goes back several millennia, almost to the beginning of all civilizations.
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – February 2020
Rainbow Garnet: All Colors on Black.... Garnet group minerals are never short of marvels. There are more than twenty-four related species of garnets, ten of which are also known as gemstones. Structurally similar, gem garnets differ from…
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – January 2020
Fancy Zoisite: A collector’s mineral from Austria to a celebrated gem of Tanzania. The name saualpite for a collector’s mineral from Saualpe in Carinthia, Austria must have sounded strange to Professor A. G. Werner of…
*Gem Focus & Market Pulse (Free Subscriber)Gem Focus – December 2019
Turquoise is found in many locations in the world not only in Iran, but also Tibet, China and the US. It may vary in color as well as purity. The purest sky blue material is named as robin’s egg and considered to be the finest quality when it is really compact.
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