Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

[Cind11]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

OOoo Cind11, you MUST start a thread on that ring with more photos when you get it!

It look so amazing. I am always envious of your beautiful jewelry!

Thanks MTG, for the nice compliments. I will try to take photos but then again I have never taken photos of the three settings I had made before this one haha.

 

[Cind11]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

MTG, that is a very pretty stone!!

I just received this ring from AnnMcKay. She was very nice to deal with and I like how similar her work is to James Meyer's. This ruby is unheated and from Gene Flanigan. The ring is 18K white gold alloyed with palladium si it is not plated and has a 22K bezel around the ruby and platinum bezels around the diamonds. I don't know what the sort of "line" is on the front of the bezel around the ruby. It is not there in real life.

Did she source the stone for you or does she work with outside stones?

pixies, the stone came from Gene Flanigan of Precision Gem. I was so happy she would work with my stone!

 

[Cind11]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Cindi that ring is so awesome! I love it!

-A

Thank you Arcadian!

 

[MakingTheGrade]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

OOoo Cind11, you MUST start a thread on that ring with more photos when you get it!

It look so amazing. I am always envious of your beautiful jewelry!

Thanks MTG, for the nice compliments. I will try to take photos but then again I have never taken photos of the three settings I had made before this one haha.

Haha, you can send them to me, I'll happily take photos for you!

 

[Arkteia]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

TL, tell me more about your benitoite!!! Pic?

I bought it about 15 years ago, and it's around 70 points and it's a dark blue with blue flashes of "laser beams" that come out. I prefer my spinel to this stone, but in hindsight, benitoite does remind me a lot of violet blue spinel.

Fifteen years ago! You were already in this gem collecting business... Beautiful stone!

 

[Arkteia]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I got my 18K trillion bypass setting made, and here are the unset spinels in them. 1.91 and 1.5 carats respectively. It's a 7mm and 8mm bypass. I also got my blue spinel ring back from the jewelers. It's so beautiful!! I will post a separate thread.

You know, you were right, it is a beautiful color combination!

 

[Arkteia]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Beautiful piece of jewelry, Cindl1

 

[Treenbean]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Crasru Is the new avatar, that little baby kitten all growed up? What a pretty kitty.

 

[Arcadian]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Last week I purchased this. Just got it today, and OMG Its extremely beautiful. Shifts a bit in color but has no brown component at all. The cut is kinda of meh but doable given the color. I find I'm more finicky on cut when its a square cushion than any other shape.

Purchased from starruby.in on ebay. You should see how they shipped it! its pretty cool! Will do a thread on this stone when I get all my pictures situated but here's a few pics





Ignore my dry ass hands, I had to do a hella lot of snow shoveling..

-A

 

[Fly Girl]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I plunked down a deposit yesterday to get a first viewing at local Minneapolis designer T Lee's next gemstone viewing. T leaves on a rough buying trip to Tanzania in January, and her rough will then be cut by two of her favorite cutters, Richard Homer and Roger Dery. Thirty of us "investors" will get first dibs at the finished stones in May, 2011. If we don't choose a stone, we get our deposit back.

My wish list for T was "anything in the red family". I spoke to her on the phone, and she is like a little kid, so excited. I wanted to invest just for the experience, if nothing else. It will definitely be worth it. In the meantime, I must start saving up more pennies in case the perfect stone appears in May.

T is back from Africa with a great haul of rough. I asked for a sneak preview and got this photo in return. T's description:

Image of Gemstone Rough From Left to Right:
Aquamarine, Clean Amazing Chrome Tourmaline, Iolite
Spessartite, Congo Tourmaline, Bright Red Spinel, more Spessartite, Rare Mint Grossular Garnet
More Mehenge Spinel, tons of Rhodolite in huge sizes, Massive Scapolite, Lavendar Spinel
Purple Zircon, Congo Tourmaline Bar-enormous and clean, Raspberry Zircon.

She says this is just a small part of the rough and her first batch has already been shipped to Roger Dery to begin cutting. I'm going to try to get into the shop soon to see more of her rough. No one can see the finished stones until they are unveiled on May 5th. So excited.

 

[FrekeChild]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I am having a pink sapphire melee ring made in honor of my mom...not anything amazing, but most certainly very sentimental...

 

[y2kitty]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

That rough picture is amazing. Like sugar rock candy.

 

[Arcadian]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Received my red spinel today. Its got some definite orange to it, which I can see more in incandescent lighting. Some definite color shift in different lighting situations. Really rocks in low light conditions. Its pretty hard to get pictures of that, I'll try that on another day. I also noticed its got quite a weak fluoro to it...not the fluoro that any of my mehenge's have.

We don't have any sun today so no idea what its going to do in the sun.

No extinction on this stone that I can see, lots of facet play though and decently cut...no windowing aside from the usual tilt windows. In my pictures, my head gets in the way taking the picture ( I just have a big head y'all!) and I'm freezing cold as I'm standing outside trying to take pictures. The stone itself is not very big, but the color packs quite a punch.

Have only taken a few pics today, will try to get more in the future.




-A

 

[VapidLapid]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

making some progress. I made the 20 karat then thought it might not be enough material to work with so made the 18 karat with the same amount of gold but more silver. Today I made the steel tool that I will use to make the seat in the metal for the stone

 

[Arcadian]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

very cool Vapid! I've always been curious how the different types of gold was made. so did you have to remelt the gold to add the silver. Can you tell I don't really know any of this stuff?

-A

 

[VapidLapid]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Arcadian, I started with 24karat gold and grain pure silver, weighed them, mixed them in proportion and melted, with stirring.
18kt is 75% gold by weight, 20 karat is 83.33%. I'm surprised it is done by weight and not molar units. I guess Avogadro wasnt a metalurgist.

 

[FrekeChild]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

VL, can I come hang with you for a week?

 

[Arcadian]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us




-A

 

[bobsiv]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Hi, I'm new to the forum and this is my first post. I have been a hobby faceter for about a year now. It's nice to find an online community that shares my love for colored stones. Here's one I finished recently that I'm proud of, it's a 9.55 ct Namibian tourmaline with some interesting color bands.

 

[VapidLapid]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

welcome bobsiv. Awesome stone you have there.

Freke you are welcome to hang with me anytime you want!

 

[Arcadian]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Hi Bob and welcome.

just an fyi, if you're in the gem trade, you'll want to make sure you're not showing stones on the forum that you sell. If they're from your own personal stash that you keep, we wanna see!!!


-A

 

[MakingTheGrade]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Welcome Bob!

I love that opposed bar cut!

 

[bobsiv]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Thanks for the welcome and thanks for the tip, only personal collection gems (almost everything I cut goes to my wife anyways).

 

[MakingTheGrade]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Thanks for the welcome and thanks for the tip, only personal collection gems (almost everything I cut goes to my wife anyways).

Lucky woman

 

[mastercutgems]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Welcome Bob;

Very nice gem and cutting

My wife still gets a large number of my gems too
Yikes it is almost Valentines Day; better get to cutting something neat...

Most respectfully;

Dana

 

[FrekeChild]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I'm gonna go visit VL!

 

[jstarfireb]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I set my first piece myself today. I had a freebie 9mm blue sheen moonstone cab from Dana, so I bought a cheapo silver cab setting on ebay and used brute strength to set it. Aside from the setting having shoddy filigree (what do you expect for $10?), I have to say it looks great! And I managed not to damage anything in the process...stone, setting, or fingers.

 

[MakingTheGrade]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

I set my first piece myself today. I had a freebie 9mm blue sheen moonstone cab from Dana, so I bought a cheapo silver cab setting on ebay and used brute strength to set it. Aside from the setting having shoddy filigree (what do you expect for $10?), I have to say it looks great! And I managed not to damage anything in the process...stone, setting, or fingers.

That's awesome Jstar!

 

[LtlFirecracker]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

Just received this small emerald cab, it is a keeper. I will try to get better pics this weekend, the vendor pics do not do it justice.

 

[chrono]

Re: Catch all thread - talk or better yet show us

That cab looks very dreamy. More info on it please.