Eye Candy Friday: Cartier, LeVian and Van Cleef & Arpels

LeVian: Rarest Blue-Green Paraiba Tourmaline Gemstone

High jewelry is always fun to see, whether it's due to the spectacular design of top jewelers or the clean, heirloom-quality gemstones. What’s not to like? Well, the price, which has so many zeros that regular wage-earners can’t afford to buy it. At least we are spared the temptation, right? And we can be inspired to find budget-friendlier pieces that give us the characteristics we find attractive. 

Cartier’s Pathère Collection of white and yellow diamonds, or diamonds and emeralds

Nonetheless, never buy the so called more affordable lines from Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels, or Bulgari, etc., etc, etc., because these same luxury brands that craft the high jewelry we admire charge inflated prices for their lesser lines, and you’ll pay thousands of dollars mainly for the names alone, not for the amount of gold or the quality of gemstones you’ll get. LeVian is the exception, as it sells its lower-end consumer-grade jewelry at major department stores such as Macy’s, which also runs its own sales.

The center vivid yellow diamond weighs 10 carats.

One place where you don't pay the inflated markup charged by the luxury brands named will surprise you. Costco! The discount retailer applies a low markup of roughly 14% to 15% on its fine jewelry. Unlike at Harry Winston, Cartier, or Van Cleef & Arpels, at Costco you’re paying for the gold, gemstones, and a small markup to keep the lights on, not a 500% markup for a fancy box, tissue paper, and a name.

Costco sells real gold and sterling silver. In the USA, real gold is regulated by stamps that state its purity, either by karat designation or fineness number (representing parts per 1000 of pure gold and you will see these marks at Costco:

- 24K (999): 99.9% pure gold (24 out of 24 parts)
- 18K (750): 75% pure gold
- 14K (585): 58.5% pure gold
- 10K (417): 41.7% gold, which is the minimum karat allowed to be sold as "solid gold" in the United States. 

Likewise, real sterling silver is marked 925 (92.5% pure silver and 7.5% other metal to harden it) in the USA.

LaVian Neon Blue Paraiba Tourmaline™

So now let’s oogle the very expensive high jewelry pieces and cute leopard.

All images are from the respective jewelers’ ads or websites. Google the name of the collection for more information on the pieces. A look is all I need today since buying them is as out of the question for a Savvy Shopper as petting that pretty predatory leopard: "Goodness, what big teeth you have!"🐆

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What Makes Green Diamonds?

From Instagram - The Aurora

After writing last Thursday's blog, I got curious about green diamonds. I don’t recall ever seeing one. This might be because they make up less than 0.1% of all fancy-colored diamonds on earth. After red, green diamonds are the 2nd rarest diamonds. Unlike most diamonds that get their colors from chemical impurities entering their atomic structure, green diamonds get their color from natural radiation. Over millions of years, alpha and beta rays emitted by radioactive minerals knock carbon atoms out of place in the crystal structure, changing how the stone absorbs light. In other words, radiation exposure creates carbon atom vacancies. This vacancy defect, also known as the GR1 center in a diamond, causes the green color.

According to Only National Diamonds, radiation from alpha particles usually only penetrates a few micrometers deep, leaving a shallow green "skin" on rough stones. Diamond cutters must plan and facet the gem with expert precision to evenly distribute this color throughout the stone. It may explain why we see more radiant cuts in this fancy colored gemstone. The radiant cut’s faceting maximizes light reflection, which intensifies and saturates the color of the stone, making it appear more vivid.

A very few green diamonds are also colored by more complex defects involving nitrogen, hydrogen, or nickel.

The world’s natural green diamonds come from South America and Africa. Nowadays, laboratory irradiation can also produce green diamonds. It’s challenging to tell natural-grown and lab-grown green diamonds apart. Both are real diamonds. It’s unlawful to sell lab-grown diamonds without transparency.

The scarcity of green diamonds makes them very pricey. Just like other colored gemstones, color is the most important of the fancy diamond Cs (followed by cut, carat, and clarity) in determining value. As their color becomes more saturated and vibrant, prices rise dramatically. Based on their GIA color intensity grade for a 1-carat stone, a Fancy Green color costs from $50,000 - $100,000; a Fancy Intense Green costs between $150,000 - $200,000, and a Fancy Vivid Green costs $300,000+.

Photo: Wikipedia
The Dresden Green Diamond

The Dresden Green, a 41-carat diamond originating from India’s Golconda mines, is the largest and most famous natural green diamond in the world. It is a chemically pure IIa diamond with VS1 clarity. Frederick Augustus II, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, paid 400,000 thalers for the diamond in 1741. Perhaps someone should have told Diespach, the court jeweler of Saxony, that fads come and go before, in 1768, he mounted the Dresden Green as an elaborate hat ornament surrounded by 411 white diamonds.😁 Today, it is on display in the Green Vault at Dresden Castle in Germany. The renowned green diamond survived the Seven Years’ War, the Napoleonic Wars, World Wars I and II, its confiscation by the Soviets, who returned it to Dresden in 1958, and the 2019 Dresden Museum heist of royal jewels. Thankfully, at the time of the theft, the Dresden Green was on loan to the Metropolitan Museum in Manhattan.

The Aurora Green (👆top image) is a 5.02 carat Fancy Vivid Green rectangular radiant cut diamond with VS2 clarity. The Aurora Green is surrounded by pink diamonds set in a ring. Found in Brazil, it sold for a wooping $16.8 million, the most expensive price ever paid for a green diamond, at Christie’s Hong Kong in 2016. Chow Tai Fook Jewellery bought it. Without fluorescence, its GIA-rated Fancy Green color is one of a kind!

Photo: Jewelry Point

Personally, I’d rather pay less money to get a bigger, more common white (clear) diamond. Other jewelry lovers may covet uniqueness over size. 

Ultra-rare fancy-colored diamonds are so wildly expensive that customers fork over a ton of moola for a tiny stone, so I wouldn’t buy, but visit them at Tiffany’s New York flagship store or the museums around the world that house them. First a dreamer, then a realist ... and perhaps an adventurous traveler is the way to get more bang for your buck!💚

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What Gives Fancy Diamonds & Sapphires Their Colors?

Gemstone Brittleness And Cleavage

These are Macy’s commercial-grade gemstones - amethyst, garnet, fancy colored sapphires, citrine, ruby, and emerald.

Earrings, necklaces, and bracelets take fewer knocks, but if you splurge on a ring, for durability, you might want to consider a gemstone's brittleness and cleavage, along with its hardness.

Princess Grace's ring

Hardness refers to a gemstone's rating from 1 (softest) to 10 (hardest) on Mohs' Hardness Scale, which reflects its resistance to surface scratching. While a diamond rates a 10 for hardness, it's actually a brittle gemstone that, upon impact, will crack more easily than other gemstones.

Queen Camila's ring

Cleavage is the gemstone's grain. Just like with beef or wood, a crystalline structure (meaning its atomic arrangement) is internally symmetrical. Cleavage refers to natural, predictable planes of weakness within a gemstone's structure where its atomic bonds are frail. These are the areas where a crystal is more likely to shatter.

Wallis Simpson's ring

Brittleness describes how easily a stone breaks or chips if struck. All faceted gemstones are considered brittle, yet how brittle they are depends on their cleavage. A gemstone's cleavage is a major factor in its brittleness and significantly lowers its toughness.

Queen Marguritta II's ring

So what is toughness? If a stone has excellent cleavage (like a diamond or topaz), hitting it at the exact right angle along that plane can cause it to split cleanly in two. Toughness describes a gemstone's resistance to breaking, chipping, or cracking when a heavy blow is applied. As it happens, diamonds have perfect cleavage planes in 4 directions, giving them relatively poor toughness. Despite being the hardest stone on Earth, a perfectly placed hit can cause diamonds to split along their planes (i.e., grains) just like a piece of wood.

Queen Victoria's ring

A cutter of gemstones uses this knowledge to determine how to cut a gemstone. Customers can use it to buy safer and more durable gemstones for everyday wear.

Some gemstones, such as sapphires and rubies, have no cleavage. Their tightly packed atomic structures resist breaking, making them far less brittle and giving them much higher toughness over diamonds to wear as daily rings.

Emeralds have imperfect cleavage in one direction (basal cleavage). Their cleavage and natural internal inclusions (jardins) make them brittle and prone to chipping.

Josephine Beauharnais' ring

Tough Gemstones For Daily Rings are:

Corundum (ruby and sapphire), spinel, alexandrite, moissanites, quartz (amethyst, citrine, agate, jasper), jade (both types), garnets, and turquoise.

High Risk Gemstones for Daily Rings include:

Emerald, topaz, tanzanite, moonstone, sunstone, labradorite, kuzite, and diamond.

Queen Maxima’s ring

Still, if you love the higher-risk gemstones and yearn to wear them as everyday rings, you can do so by selecting protective bezel or halo settings; remove them when you work or wash your hands; and (less desirable) only wear them for special occasions. In other words, be mindful and prepared to baby them. 

jardins in an emerald 

Frankly, I think we should never work or wash our hands with soap without removing all our gemstone rings. I keep a ring holder by the kitchen sink and take off my rings whenever cleaning. Jewelry is never cheap, so why take unnecessary risks? You always want to keep gemstones pristine and sparkling! 

 Queen Alexandra (Alix of Denmark), Queen Letizia of Spain, Diana & Catherine of Wales rings

Famous royal engagement rings are featured throughout today's blog, but no one needs to be engaged to wear a ring!

Ring holder with my fun to wear, inexpensive white sapphire ring

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The 3 Other Precious Gemstones In The Raw

Recently I wrote a blog about raw rubies before they are cut, polished and turned into jewelry. Today I’m posting images of the 3 other precious gemstones in the raw. When we visualize gemstones, mostly we see them as the sparklers they become after craftsmen and jewelers get their hands on them like the above Harry Winston diamond ring. Not how them start or grow in nature, but how they are finished, right? So let's look at a few images of gemstones as they are found in nature.

I. Diamonds are a single element. Formula: C. A diamond is an allotrope of the element carbon. Its structure is a rigid three-dimensional lattice where each carbon atom is bonded to four other carbon atoms in a tetrahedral arrangement. A diamond’s atoms are arranged in a crystal structure called a diamond cubic. The gemstone rates a 10 on Mohs Hardness Scale. BTW: Graphite, charcoal, and diamond are all allotropes of the element carbon.

⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧

The Aga Khan Emerald brooch and the Chalk Emerald ring

II. Emeralds - are beryls, a mineral. Its formula, Be3Al2(SiO3)6, is colored green by trace amounts of chromium or sometimes vanadium. On Mohs Hardness Scale emeralds rate an 8. They were formed under the most violent of geologic conditions, which is why less than 1% of the world’s emeralds are eye clean. Unlike diamonds, inclusions and surface breaking fissures called  jardins are common and accepted in emerads. 

⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧ ๋࣭ ⭑✧⋆ ๋࣭ ⭑✧

The Swedish royal family's Leuchtenberg Sapphire tiara and an unheated Kashmir 9.38 sapphire ring sold by Christie’s

III. Sapphires - are a variety of the mineral corundum. Its formula, α-Al2O3 consists of the elements aluminum oxide with trace amounts of iron, titanium, cobalt, lead, chromium, vanadium, magnesium, boron, and silicon. Sapphires register a 9 on Mohs Hardness scale. Blue is the most in demand color. When sapphires are yellow, orange, purple, pink, or green they are called fancy sapphires. When corundrms are red, they are rubies, not sapphires.

Gemstones take millions of years for the Earth to produce, or nowadays they can be grown in a lab, but it takes the artistry of human hands to turn these majestic crystals, beryls, and corundums into gorgeous pieces of jewelry. The next time you see a gemstone think of its journey and how many hands went into crafting it into a thing of beauty.

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