sunstone as jewelry?

[tsuns]

Can someone educate me on sunstone? It seems out of the mainstream of jewels and yet I have seen some that look almost identical in color to rubies. What makes sunstone so much less expensive? Yet, I have seen prices around $300/ct for a Tibet mined sunstone of brilliant red color. I admit...I am new to the gem world, yet drawn to it''s beauty. I don''t want to get ripped off on pricing. Any info appreciated.

 

[colormyworld]

tsuns welcome to p.s. There is a thread called new pendant & earring T.V. stone That thread has a lot of info. Regards Doug

 

[valeria101]

It is just not that usual... especialy the ones mines in the US can be quite expensive because the source got its fame and following. the enw all-red material is sometimes called Andesine - same material, better red color and a different look than the now classic Dust Devil sunstone. I am not sure if Andesine ever comes with schiller - but who cares wne it is that darn red!

The comparison to rubies ends with the color - Andesine is softer and less brilliant (by RI alone). Of course, deep colored ruby is not very bright itself because of the depth of color... so not much is lost there. There isn''t much of anything out there to compare with the very best of rubies, but then, few rubies get there anyway. Andesine is more convincing red than all of garnet that I know of though. So.. it makes a great choice among all red gemstones. It is a newcommer, with not much recognition yet, IMO.

This is about all I know of the matter.

As for examples online, Pala came up with a wonder, there are a few on older threads here and then a small shop (LINK) I happen to know of got a few pieces in fancy precission cut, among which this:

Btw. this one is Congolese - there are several sources of red ''sunstone'' feldspar around.