Star stones

[andrejmx]

Please advice me where to buy nic star sones. Doesn''t matter what type of stone. Just top quality. I like them so much. Thank you.

 

[mogok]

Well traditionally in Burma or in Sri Lanka you will find some excellent star rubies and sapphires.
Today in Colombo where I''m now I saw several interesting star sapphires.
You might also find some nice star rubies in Vietnam besides the typical semi transparent regular ones, I''ve seen some very attractive crystalline stones there during my last trip and the star was excellent looking.

All the best,

 

[Sasori]

Hi People,
I''m looking at getting a piece of star sapphire to satisfy my curosity and add to my simple collection.
However, I noted that there are lot of diffusion/enhanced stones around. How probable is the below stone being 100% untreated?
And is there any online recommendation for star sapphire/rubies purchase?

Regards
Ryan

 

[al88]

the problem is not " treated " sapphire but fake sapphire especially when the star is so clear and neat. the star can be just a man created star

 

[MY Nguyen]

Hi,
I find Vincent Pardieu''s recent trip to VN really interesting.
I did''nt know about Conch pearl until I saw the photos you''ve taken Vincent. Merci.
I''d like to go see the gem market in Yen Bai- North VN- but I don''t know how to get there????
I am collecting Vietnamese star ruby and fancy color sapphires. I can buy fancy sapphires (gray, pink, yellow...) and even star ones here in Saigon at a very very cheap price ( compared to the prices in Internet????).
I am designing my own jewelry collection with ruby & sapphire ... just for fun (qui sait, je pourrais peut faire fortune... hehehe)
Will show you all my collection one of these days. Hope to meet you one day in Saigon.
MY Nguyen

 

[Cave Keeper]

Hi, Vincent (Pardieu)

I can''t remember your name, looks different from a year ago. Aren''t you the one that teaches in a gemmelogy institute in Bangkok. The last thing I remember about you was asking you to look for a Star Imperial Jade stone when you were about to make a little trip in the highlands of mysterious Burma. And you also helped a site run by your students (what''s that site called, I can''t remember it and my previous desktop system was overwhelmed by viruses?).

 

[valeria101]

Date: 5/14/2005 3:12:27 AM
Author:andrejmx
Please advice me where to buy nic star sones. Doesn''t matter what type of stone. Just top quality. I like them so much. Thank you.

Among the shops talked about on this forum, Palagems, Cherrypickes, TheNaturalSapphireComapny and Awesomegems keeps some on their internet displays. It is the easiest way to ''see'' or at least become aware of such options.

Literally a couple more reside at Gemwow (see their top collection HERE) and perhaps Acstones (THIS).

What the jewelers around you have to offer and how that compares, no way to know

You ask about ''any star stone'' - honestly, I think of sapphires and rubies as having visible stars and that''s pretty much all. Of course, other gems have stars, but just week ones or there is some other problem. You will probably find star quartz (like the large pink oval below), beryl, crysoberyl, rutile or who knows what else, but then do ask what it takes to see that star effect because most are week - gemological curiosities as much as star gemstones.

Hope some of this makes sene...

Btw:

These are pink quartz and ruby stars from GemWow: the least and the most expensive type, as much as I know.

 

[Cave Keeper]

Date: 8/11/2005 7:52:09 AM
Author: valeria101
:
You ask about ''any star stone'' - honestly, I think of sapphires and rubies as having visible stars and that''s pretty much all. Of course, other gems have stars, but just week ones or there is some other problem. You will probably find star quartz (like the large pink oval below), beryl, crysoberyl, rutile or who knows what else, but then do ask what it takes to see that star effect because most are week - gemological curiosities as much as star gemstones.
:
Btw:

These are pink quartz and ruby stars from GemWow: the least and the most expensive type, as much as I know.

Hi, Val101

Yes, Gemwow.com was the Thai website which I was trying to recall. Their Burmese Gem Gallery is so entertaining. Thanks, Val101.

Regarding star visibility, what kind of lighting conditions are you assuming to judge whether the star of a star gemstone has adequate visibility? Halogen, incadescent, daylight fluorescent, plain fluorescent, natural daylight, noontime sunlight. Sorry I''m asking such simple questions, but I don''t have much experience with star gemstones, especially gemgrade ohes. BTW, do star gemstones have to be above transparent/translucent grade, i.e., F, IF, VVS, VS, SI, in order to be considered gemstone quality?

 

[valeria101]

Date: 8/11/2005 10:12:55 AM
Author: Cave Keeper

#1. Regarding star visibility, what kind of lighting conditions are you assuming to judge whether the star of a star gemstone has adequate visibility?

#2. [...] do star gemstones have to be above transparent/translucent grade, i.e., F, IF, VVS, VS, SI, in order to be considered gemstone quality?

Good Qs... don't think anyone asked them before around here. Perhaps there is more to the story than I can tell, asmuch as I know though both questions relate to where the star effect comes from in the first place. Stars are due to inclusions (long orderly and extremely thin needles of some mineral), and inclusions affect both color and clarity. So there is a tradeoff between the intensity of the star effect and both color and clarity: the clearer the star, the more grayish and the less transparent the stone. This also means that star cabs that are translucent and have reasonably good color are highly prized. The strongest stars appear in opaque material and often grayish and those are not expensive - relatively.

Otherwise, I would keep in mind the same mantra for the cabs... and look for smooth texture in that silk and no other stryking inclusion breaking it on the top. Actually, if there are fractures and other inclusions the star effect gets easily distorted, and that does affect both looks and value.

Anyway, the page at Palagems about star sapphire makes the case very well. And the matching bit at Cherrypicked.com adds some more detail about what is desirable about the star effect. Both explain very well what makes these stones expensive. To my taste, the only bit missing from that exposition is giving some freedom of choice and peace of mind to someone who tries to develop their own preferences and taste rather than 'investment portfolio'. After all, those sapphire stars of unusual color or somehow else judge outside the top of the market deserve some attention - many are downright beautiful and it is even hard to know they exist given how little 'publicity' there is.

About lighting (question #1) - it is not as much intensity that helps as directional lighting. Spotlights are the best to show the star effect although not 'natural' or usual. Strong daylight is too. Than the color could look better in one light than another, but that depends on the stone,

just IMO, as usual. Hope it helps.

 

[spinel]

In star-rubies the star phenomenon is a mere matter of inclusions. The more included is the stone, stronger are the stars and lower is the price! In one word you will find strong star rays in very very included and of course opaque stones.
I see frequently novice buyers pay high price for strong star-rubies when it should not be the way.

Hereby are some guidelines to appreciate star-rubies in least to most important order:
. The star is well centered with uninterrupted and well aligned rays alongside of the stone;
. Double and distinctive stars in one stone resulting from a merge of two crystals with different axes of inclusions at time of formation;
. More red less purple in color;
. Weaker stars with more transparency
. Star colors: white is common, pink to red stars are the most looked after, some Birmese 'red stars' rubies are up to 40k a carat.

My Nguyen: Visiting Luc Yen is quite simple: Go to Hanoi Gia Lam bus station, take the bus direction Yen Bai and then Luc Yen. Choose a front seat otherwise you will get a severe back-ache. The journey should take 10 hours in all and the landscape is absolutely beautiful. Luc Yen has decent and comfortable hotels. Wake up at 6:00 AM to catch the start of the gem market. Watch out for synthetics! High-valued stones are not actually found there even in Saigon, they had their ways already. Be aware of stones you buy in Saigon or Hanoi, most come from Thailand! Most are lattice-diffusioned or synthetic, stones they call African's ("Hang- Phi"). Vietnamese labs are diamond-oriented, don't have equipements to detect lattice-diffusion nor the capacity to detect complicated synthetics unfortunately.

Chào Cô

All the bests,

 

[MY Nguyen]

Dear Spinel
Thanks a lot for all the information on how to get to Luc Yen.
Doesn''t seem that easy to me! I''ll need a chaperon!!!

Chao Anh

MY Nguyen

 

[Cave Keeper]

Date: 8/14/2005 4:41:37 PM
Author: spinel
In star-rubies the star phenomenon is a mere matter of inclusions. The more included is the stone, stronger are the stars and lower is the price! In one word you will find strong star rays in very very included and of course opaque stones.
I see frequently novice buyers pay high price for strong star-rubies when it should not be the way.
:

Real glad to learn that the stones with the strong stars should be the cheapest. I find that somehow the opaque stones look very crystal-like, perhaps because their cabochon shape causes them to be very reflective so that their opacity doesn''t matter; so the star matters more to me.

Wonder where we can buy those without paying high Gem Hut/Mineral Miners prices?

 

[mogok]

Date: 8/11/2005 6:01:22 AM
Author: Cave Keeper
Hi, Vincent (Pardieu)


I can''t remember your name, looks different from a year ago. Aren''t you the one that teaches in a gemmelogy institute in Bangkok. The last thing I remember about you was asking you to look for a Star Imperial Jade stone when you were about to make a little trip in the highlands of mysterious Burma. And you also helped a site run by your students (what''s that site called, I can''t remember it and my previous desktop system was overwhelmed by viruses?).

Hello MY Nguyen and Cave Keeper,

Sorry not to have answered to you aerlier but in Kenya and Tanzania bush where I was on field trip it was most of the time impossible to have some water in the hotel so dont ask about an internet connection...
I''ve to say that I did not spend the time I would have like to spend on pricescope for quite a long time.

Whatever, this is true that before on this forum I was writting under the name "Mogok", but I think that the name has now changed in all my former posts.
I was teaching at the AIGS gemological school in Bangkok but not anymore: Now I''m the AIGS Gemological Laboratory Director...

About the trip to Vietnam, it is simple I went to Luc Yen with the help of my pricescope friend "spinel". We met on pricescope, I PM to him and he accpeted to help me on this fieldtrip which was very nice.
Thanks to pricescope and him this trip was great! I''m really happy that you liked these galleries. I hope by the way that you will appreciate the other galleries that I will put on line soon about my fieldtrip to ruby and sapphire mines in Burma, Sri Lanka, Madagascar, Kenya and Vietnam. I plan to put on line 5000 photos with of course the adapted comments.
I think that after one month it should be on line if I''m not dead before...

All the best,

All the best,

 

[Cave Keeper]

Hi, Vincent

Glad to know you''ll be around now.

BTW, since you''re a qualified gemmologist, I would like to ask you how should a 16 carat yellow sapphire be sent overseas to a lab, e.g., yours in Thailand as an illustration.

There are people who sent stones by simply putting them in tiny zip-lock type plastic bags; others wrap them in tissue paper before putting them into the same type of bags. Then they put the stones into the type of envelope which have interior bubble-wrap lining. And these are sent via registered air mail.

If the stone is pretty valuable, should it be sent that way?

 

[Ymanda]

Hi,

It does not matter how the stone is sent, which kind of package, what so ever. What is important is your relationship with the guy who send the stone and the quality of the stone itself. If you are happy with the stone you receive everything is ok.

No fake behavior, no scam, you should be happy already.

Yannick

the all seeing eye looking after you.

 

[Cave Keeper]

Date: 8/27/2005 8:32:08 PM
Author: Ymanda
:
What is important is your relationship with the guy who send the stone and the quality of the stone itself. If you are happy with the stone you receive everything is ok.

No fake behavior, no scam, you should be happy already.

Yannick
:

My, a rather happy-go-lucky guy, aren''t you?

Problem is the only relationship existing is a contractual one and the rest which you state are unknowns.

 

[Edward Bristol]

Cavekeeper,
make sure you get a good transport inscurance.
Best: the insurer should be part of, or affiliated with, the transporter.
Otherwise, in worst case, transporter and insurer just fingerpoint at each other and u get nothing at the end of the day.
Edward Bristol
www.wildfishgems.com

 

[Cave Keeper]

Date: 8/27/2005 10:23:08 PM
Author: Edward Bristol
Cavekeeper,

make sure you get a good transport inscurance.
:
Edward Bristol
www.wildfishgems.com

Thanks, Ed, but it''ll probably boil down to just plain FedEx, DHL or UPS and their bubblewrap envelopes. I believe the maximum insurance cover available is only $200.

 

[mogok]

Hi Cave Keeper,
Well somewhere there is no problem but you have to consider that there could be some serious custom clearance problems. If you send a stone in Thailand through the post then things can get uneasy... It not a common practice in our lab to receive stone by the post, but we will enquiry about possibilities. Now most of our foreign customer ask their suppliers to send us the stones that they are intending to buy.
The thing is that in Thailand, the is a VAT to pay when a stone enter the country but if it is a loose stone there is particlular formality to send a stone abroad.

Hoping to have helped,
All the best,

 

[Edward Bristol]

".. is a VAT to pay when a stone enter the country but if it is a loose stone there is particlular formality to send a stone abroad."

Vincent, we do pay tax when we bring stones from Sri Lanka to Thailand, but then we just sendt them out without any formality: Simply declared as gemstone and value over Fedex.
What is that formality we obviously ignore? Are we doing it wrong? I thought Thaigem&Co send thousands of stones daily without any formality.
We are currently thinking to start bulk-shipping to bangkok and then to single-ship from there, because it is easier than the burocracy in the Sri lankan Gem authority. Isn''t it???
Thanks for your advice.

Edward Bristol
www.wildfishgems.com

 

[MY Nguyen]

Hi Vincent,
I''ve read your explanation about star and I''ve just found out that I have 3 trapiche stars among my "aquarium pebbles". As you''ve mentionned, trapiche stars are most of the time found in sapphires. Mine are grey sapphires. Perhaps the cutter did not know about trapiche star is as it was not centered at all.
When I selected them, I just found it funny to have a kind of flower drawn on the stone like that.

Have a good day!!

 

[MY Nguyen]

Here are my trapiche stars!
The photos are not so good but I hope you can see the stars.

 

[mogok]

Hi MY Nguyen,

Yes, these stones are polished trapiche sapphires. They look very close from many stones I saw in Burma coming from Mogok... About trapiche sapphires, my Burmese friend Kyaw Khine Win has published a study in a recent (may be the last issue) Australian Gemologist about these stones. You can see there the different types of trapiche found in Burma: From quartz, to morganite (in Molo, near Momeik) sapphire (Mogok and Namya), and ruby (Mong Hsu and very rare possibly in Mogok also)...
I like also these funny stones...

All the best,

 

[MY Nguyen]

Hi Vincent,
Wow, I don''t think my sapphires have made such a long way. They must be vietnamese just like me.

Have a nice day.

 

[glitterata]

Hey, that''s cool!

 

[MY Nguyen]

Hi Glitterata,
Thanks,

 

[spinel]

Happy to see Vincent (Mogok) and Yannick (Ymanda) back on this forum

 

[spinel]

Hi All,

This is an example of a start-to-be-fine star ruby where the color and transparency are both present before stars. The photo was taken indoor and absolutely unenhanced.

 

[spinel]

Resized the photo for better fit.

 

[spinel]

Same stone under flashlight.