Opals

Carved spectrolite moon faces in 18k and 22k gold with diamonds

Happy summer everyone.  I hope many of you are getting some time off to refresh and rejuvenate.  We closed for the July 4th weekend and it was a nice break (although not nearly long enough).

I know it always sounds great to someone who doesn't have their own business to be self employed but, unfortunately it's not nearly as romantic or relaxing as it sometimes seems.  So even on my short four day break over July 4th I found myself doing business.  Not that it wasn't fun business, but it was still business.  My opal and pearl dealer was in town and when he is, he routinely stays with us.  I wasn't looking for much material but I always look at everything he has. 

What is becoming more and more apparent is that opal prices have skyrocketed in the last five years.  While the normal, commercial white opal hasn't seen this explosion in prices, the more unusual material like the boulder opal I use and black opal has just gone through some enormous changes.  This has happened across the board in these materials.  Low end material that I used to sell for $100 I would now have to sell for $3-400.  The problem with this is that it doesn't look any better than it did when I was selling it for $100.  The higher end material has also seen huge rises in cost.  Some of this rise is simply due to the burgeoning Asian market.  There is a vast amount of new wealth in Asia today and the Asian market has always appreciated fine gemstones.  Additionally there is a limited supply of fine material that can be mined and, unlike a diamond which is forever, a lot of opal material breaks down over time (usually a long period of time) so it isn't like a huge amount of old material will ever come back into the marketplace. 

So what's an opal lover (like myself) to do?  Well first of all I don't see prices going down ever.  Barring an extended world wide depression there is simply no reason for the prices to go down from where they are.  Mining costs in Australia will only continue to rise.  The market for fine material will continue to grow.  There will be less and less material being mined as sources are depleted.  So, personally I would buy it now before it gets even more costly. 

While we were going through my opal man's collection of better material (ranging in price from about $1500-$15,000) he was watching me as I would stop at certain pieces that attracted my attention more than others. When I finished he looked at me and told me that every piece I had stopped at was from his personal collection that he has begun to sell off slowly.  Leave it to me to appreciate only the best and most interesting ones.  Two of those pieces I bought because they were so unusual and wild looking (and affordable).  One should be out in a pendant within a week or so and I'll post a picture of it (although I'm not sure if we're going to be able to get the colors showing up properly).  The other one may go into my own personal collection. 

Please stop by if you'd like to see these two beauties!

The earrings above were a custom job for a customer late last year and were some of my few remaining carved spectrolite faces. 









                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        
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Alexandrite Again

Jellyfish Earrings

Four years ago I wrote a blog article about alexandrite.  It is still the most commented on blog I have written.  Unfortunately, although I have reread it a number of times to check for clarity it seems that a lot of the people who comment haven't been able to understand some of the things I said so I'm going to try again here and specifically deal with the issues that they are having a hard time understanding.

Natural alexandrite is one of the most expensive gem materials available (at least in fine qualities).  The stone is known as a "phenomenal" stone because it exhibits the phenomenon known as "color change".  This means that a gemstone, when exposed to different types of light sources (usually fluorescent vs. incandescent), will change colors.  Stones sold to you as alexandrite that do not display any color change are actually chyrsoberyl and not alexandrite.  The color change is from a greenish tone to a very slightly purplish red tone (red is the key word here).

Alexandrite can occur in large sizes but is extremely rare in large sizes.  High quality stones over 2 cts. will routinely run into the tens of thousands of dollars.  They have always been expensive.  There are basically only three major sources for them: Russia (which isn't a large producer anymore), Brazil (where the mine owners flooded the mine a number of years ago because of the number of deaths at the mine---due to the high value of the goods not due to the dangers of mining----this mine might have been reopened more recently but I'm not sure about that) and Sri Lanka.

So here's the deal:  If you have a large stone in your possession that changes color, unless you come from considerable wealth, you most likely do not have an alexandrite.

In the 1890's synthetic corundum first came on the market.  By the middle of the 20th century there was a vast amount of color change synthetic corundum coming into the marketplace that was often sold as alexandrite (both mistakenly and in an attempt to deceive).  This material was routinely 1) large, 2) cut in very regular sizes and 3) exhibits a bluish green to purple color change.  Let me repeat number 3:  It exhibits a bluish green to purple color change.  Alexandrite exhibits a greenish/red color change.

So if you have inherited a really large color change stone, and there is no red/green color change you don't have an alexandrite; you have a synthetic sapphire.  It doesn't matter if it came from your parents, grandparents or great grandmother.  They had these stones then too.  If you bought a really large color change stone and there is no red/green color change you don't have an alexandrite.

It is an incredibly easy test to determine the difference between corundum and alexandrite.  Any semi competent gemologist (and most competent jewelers) can tell you which it is in minutes, assuming they even need to test the material. 

As I explained in the original article on alexandrite there is synthetic alexandrite that exhibits all of the same phenomena as natural alexandrite (as it is actually alexandrite, just made by man) on the market today.  This was a much more recent development and the material is not nearly as inexpensive as the synthetic corundum.  This is harder to separate from natural alexandrite because it shows the same colors as natural material.  For this kind of distinction you may need a gem lab to look at the material.  But again, they don't generally produce it in large sizes.

If you are interested in color change gems but don't want to pay the price for alexandrite, I routinely have natural, color change sapphires that change from a bluish tone to a purplish tone.  There is also color change garnet available in the markteplace. 

I do really hope that someday someone will bring in a stone for me to look at that turns out to be a large alexandrite, but it hasn't happened in the past thirty-five years so I'm not holding my breath.

I have a new pair of my jellyfish earrings out.  The picture above is of the original pair but the new ones are similar. 

Summer Fun

950 platinum ring with a 1.30 ct. diamond

Despite the weather we've had the last few days summer is rapidly approaching and I thought I would give you some recommendations for proper enjoyment of the next few months, so here they are:

1) If there are sharks in the water don't go in!  This would seem kind of obvious to most people but some people really like to get close to wildlife.

2) Put on your sunscreen.  Jewelry doesn't look as good against bright red skin tones. 

3) Don't drink too much when you're at the beach.  You might not see the sharks and stumble into the water.

And last but not least:

4) DON'T WEAR YOUR GOLD JEWELRY INTO SWIMMING POOLS!

And that's actually what I wanted to talk about in this post. 

Despite my constant reminders to my customers and a plethora of information on it available on the web, I find that a large number of people still aren't aware of this issue.  The chlorine found in most swimming pools (and hot tubs) can actually dissolve small amounts of gold on your jewelry if it is exposed often enough to it.  Now this may not be much of a problem for a plain gold band, and will probably be unnoticeable on something of that sort, but if you have stones in your ring, and especially if they are set in prongs, there is a good likelihood that you may lose one of your stones. 

When gemstones are set in prong settings the prongs are cut so that they can fold over the tops of the stones to hold them in place.  The area where they are cut can be extremely thin in some cases and it doesn't take much time for chlorine to eat away at an area like that.  Suddenly you've dropped a couple of prongs into the pool and the stone goes with it.  Trust me, once the diamond has fallen out, the chance that you'll actually find the stone in a full size swimming pool is just about nil.  For some reason white gold seems to be worse when it comes to this, probably related to the most common alloys used in the gold (at least in the nickle white gold most traditional jewelers use). 

Unfortunately I know that some of you are going to take this advice and then make another mistake.  You're going to take off the jewelry when you get to the pool and there is going to be no place safe to leave the stuff while you're in the water.  Lockers at pool clubs or gyms are notoriously unsafe.  People routinely troll through any locker they can get open looking for just this type of thing.  So think about this BEFORE you head off to the local pool and leave it in a secure place in your house. 
For more information on this you should read my articles on jewelry security starting with this one  For that matter given how often we tend to leave our houses open at this time of year it would probably be a good time to read all the articles in the security series again anyway. 

So have a really wonderful summer but remember: no jewelry in pools!

950 Platinum Custom One of a Kind Diamond Engagement Ring

New From Old

I often talk about how I am happy to take in old gold pieces you might own and give you a scrap credit towards new work I can do for you.  I have also often talked about how I am happy to work with your stones as I believe firmly you retain the most amount of value by keeping them.   So here are some pictures of what I can do for you.  One of my regular readers (Hi Helen!) brought in some old gold and stones she had:

gold scrap

If you look at the small pile in the lower center of the picture you'll see two pieces with diamonds in them and a jade pendant.  Helen wanted to reuse these stones and some of my fancy colored sapphires in a pendant design based on my black mobe pearl rings pendant:

18k and 22k gold  pendant with South Sea black mobe pearl, sapphires, diamonds and emerald.

I was able to give Helen a $900 credit towards the job and this is what I came up with for her:

18k and 22k yellow gold pendant with jade, diamonds and fancy colored sapphires

I enjoyed working on this project because I happen to like the design to begin with, I was able to utilize a number of her stones in it, and we came up with something that was beautiful all at the same time. 

So if you have a bunch of old stuff lying around somewhere bring it in and let's see what we can work out together!

How To Make a Marriage Last

Handmade fine silver and 18k yellow gold chain

One of my long term regular customers, and a regular reader of my blog (hi David!) was in my shop the other day.  He had an inherited diamond we were talking about options for.  While we were chatting he told me that next year he and his wife were celebrating their 55th!!! wedding anniversary.  I was a bit in shock because it seemed like he must have gotten married when he was 5 given how young he looks. But what an amazing thing, to be able to celebrate 55 years with a person you love.  I thought I was going strong because Kathy and I celebrated our 25th late last year.  For us to make it to 55 we'll have to live to our 90's.  Of course I'm pretty sure I'm going to be working until I'm 90 so maybe we will get there too. 

So I have to wonder how did they make it last so long.  Obviously there is a great deal of love there.  But from my perspective I have to say that maybe it's the fact that at least once a year, every year, David comes in and buys something for his long time sweetheart.  Admittedly it's a small survey sample but I'm going with that as the main reason.  And given how long he's been buying from me, I have to think that it's really MY jewelry that's been responsible!  So if you want your marriage to last, you should consider making a purchase at least once a year from me.  It certainly couldn't hurt.....

I have been busy this last month, hence the limited number of postings.  I saw my new German supplier again and got some interesting new material including some wonderful new beads.  I got another strand of tumbled tanzanite beads similar to the ones I had at Christmas as well as some multicolor sapphire beads.  I also got another carved drusy moon face and have ordered a pair for earrings.  And I got a couple more pairs of carved moonstones for some more jellyfish earrings. 

I have also become acutely aware lately of how the price of gold has impacted people's ability to get some of my more interesting work so I have embarked on the first major change in metal usage I've had in ten years.  I will be producing a small line of mixed metal silver and gold necklaces and bracelets (no earrings, no rings) so that you don't have to spend $3-4000 to get into one of my pieces.  The chain pictured above is the first in this series.  It is blackened fine (pure) silver and 18k gold.  I will be adding slowly to this collection over the next 6 months.  A new bracelet is already in the works and I will be trying to add one piece every 5-6 weeks to this grouping.  I am still NOT taking custom orders in silver or silver and gold mixes but I will be offering some of my work in this more affordable manner for the foreseeable future. 

I'll be getting some new pictures up of the new beads soon.  Mother's Day is almost here.  There's no time like the present to begin a tradition of buying a present a year so you can be married for 55 years too!