What is the Gemological Institute of America?

GIA is a private, nonprofit educational institute founded in 1931 by Robert Shipley to focus on research and education in gemology and jewelry arts to professionalize the business and raise a cadre of jewelers the public could trust. A jeweler himself in the 1920s, Shipley recognized deficiencies in his knowledge, so he undertook training in Europe via the Great Britain National Association of Goldsmiths gemological course. Back in the U.S., he made it his mission to build a community of like-minded professionals.

The institute undertakes research, publishes the quarterly journal Gems & Gemology, and provides important resources for the industry, including a laboratory, library and newly developed instruments for identifying and grading gemstones. For instance, it was GIA that crafted the indispensable 10x eye loupe and devised the famous “Four C’s” approach to evaluating and grading diamonds based on cut, clarity, color and carat weight. Research conducted within institute labs develops ever-better methods for identifying, evaluating and grading gemstones and detecting synthetics and treated stones.

Equally important, GIA offers courses, programs and accreditation.

Apply and Attend GIA Worldwide

The primary GIA campus and headquarters are in Carlsbad, California. It has a worldwide presence with some 3,000 employees and campuses, labs and/or research centers in 13 countries. It also has the GIA Global Leadership Program with the Harvard Business School.

To apply and enroll in programs or courses, you need at least a high school diploma or GED and must be at least 18 years old for on-campus attendance. However, exceptions can be made for applicants as young as 16 with a high school degree and a parental letter of approval.

GIA Certification Courses and Programs

GIA offers individual courses and diploma programs. Students get hands-on experience identifying and grading gemstones, using cutting-edge instruments, identifying synthetic or treated stones and understanding the jewelry and gemstone market. General areas covered include gemology, jewelry and jewelry design. Full programs include the following and more:

• Graduate Gemologist Program®
• Graduate Diamonds Program
• Graduate Colored Stones Program
• Graduate Jeweler Program
• Jewelry Design & Technology Program
• Comprehensive CAD/CAM for Jewelry Program

Programs vary in length. For instance, the Graduate Gemologist Program® is the most comprehensive. It combines the Graduate Diamonds and the Colored Stones Programs, involves taking five courses and three labs and takes 26 weeks to complete. On the other hand, the Comprehensive CAD/CAM for Jewelry Program takes just seven weeks to complete.

A Certification Journey

Louisa May Carey, a Graduate Gemologist®, started her journey with an Applied Jewelry Professional diploma that consists of three classes, then the Graduate Pearls diploma. She says she then “went full-bore” with the endgame of reaching Graduate Gemologist®. It consists of two prerequisites of Diamond Essentials and Colored Stones Essentials then moves on to Diamond and Diamond Grading and Colored Stones Grading, including an in-person lab class for each, and lastly Gem Identification. Each eLearning class is made up of chapters with a corresponding quiz and a final exam. The remaining Gem ID course is in the traditional chapter-andquiz format with the second half adding in 500 gems sent in batches of 20 each. You complete the stone identification course and then submit it to your instructor for review. Both homework and the 20 stone final (which you can take on campus or have proctored) require a passing grade of nothing less than 100 percent.

GIA certification courses and programs are accredited by both the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC) and the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC). Beyond facts and skills, an equal focus is on instilling excellence, professionalism and high ethical standards.

Study on Campus or at Home

Most GIA certification courses can be attended either on-campus or via eLearning, but—because of their inherent hands-on nature—all lab courses must be taken on campus. Students can attend on-campus courses at the headquarters in Carlsbad or in New York. As an example, in the U.S. you can earn the Graduate Gemologist® diploma by studying full-time on campus in either Carlsbad or New York, or you can earn the same diploma by taking the five required courses online (in a media-rich environment with flexible completion times and online exams) and the three lab courses on campus.

Even when studying online, students receive individualized attention. Louisa noted that one course in particular—Gem Identification—offered the most one-on-one instruction, but GIA instructors in all courses encouraged questions from students attending in-person or online. She especially liked the virtual Student Workroom. “If you are looking for more help or want to brush up on anything, the Student Workroom allows you to reserve a ‘seat’ for a half or full day with an instructor.”

Still, despite the flexibility of the online environment, Louisa found the in-person lab classes to be the best. “In general, eLearning is more solitary and you have to be very self-motivated. For me, not having the comradery of classmates and a group graduation at the end was the biggest drawback. But looking back, I will say not having the traditional classroom experience prepared me for what my current work is like.”

Louisa cautions that sticking with it once enrolled was not easy. “Having a distance education option is amazing. That being said, working full time, juggling homework and taking vacation time for the in-person lab classes, plus finding a place to stay within a budget…let’s just say you have to LOVE it!”

GIA Certification Costs & Financial Assistance

The cost of a GIA certification ranges. For instance, basic tuition ranges from a low of about $6,000 for a seven-week Jewelry Design program to a high of approximately $23,000 for the 26-week Graduate Gemologist® program.

Tables listing tuition for each program may be found in the GIA catalog and website. Those tables also provide estimates for the total “Cost of Attendance” (COA) for each program including housing, meals, transportation, books and supplies.

With its curricula approved by the U.S. Department of Education, students enrolled in on-campus programs are qualified to apply for Title IV federal financial aid. Qualifying students can also receive veteran benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs. GIA itself offers scholarships to qualified students.

While some may look at the cost (especially total COA) and rethink, Louisa urges people to persevere, “Just like anything worth doing, before you do it there will never be enough time or money, but find a way. Investing in yourself will always be worth it.

Beyond the Courses

The research wing of GIA has invented many devices and instruments essential for gemstone testing and identification throughout its 90+ year history. Some of these are stocked in a campus store and available for students and professionals alike. Instruments range from simple tweezers and 10x loupes to spectroscopes, refractometers and polariscopes. A handy GIA Gem Identification Package, geared specifically to distance education students, provides devices for setting up a basic at-home gem testing and identification station. The store stocks books, classification charts and other print materials.

Benefits of a GIA Certification

How does being GIA-certified help in the long run? Wherever you go, people buy and wear jewelry and seek authorities they can trust. GIA can help a budding jeweler become that authority and obtain the professional skills to move to the next level.

To the average person on the street, mention gems and they’ll think of the person behind the counter in a jewelry or department store, but there are many more paths. GIA has helped people go on to careers as appraisers (for individuals, insurance companies, law enforcement), in retail sales and as wholesale buyers, as designers and bench jewelers, in the manufacturing world, and in auction houses, museums, and research and lab-based settings.

For Louisa, she learned to use state-of-the-art equipment; how to troubleshoot; how to take a moment away when looking at something too long. “I loved learning to listen and find the ‘tell’ in a gemstone and learning that if I don’t know something, to say so and how to find out. GIA did that for me. It gave me confidence. It gave me a skill set. Being able to apply my knowledge in a real-world setting was also life-changing.”

GIA Career Support

To give graduates a leg up, the institute established GIA Career Services to advise on options and how to plan and navigate the way to a successful career. They maintain a worldwide database of job offerings in the jewelry industry and hold an annual Jewelry Career Fair in Carlsbad, New York and London.

Help from GIA doesn’t end with graduation and a job. Per Louisa, “in the last few years online lectures, like the wonderful weekly GIA Knowledge Sessions, have been created. Continuing education and conversation are more accessible than ever. As a working professional, I am thankful to have such valuable platforms at my fingertips now.”

As for Louisa’s continuing journey, after a stint at an award-winning California jewelry store, she has struck out on her own. “I recently took my confidence to a new level by moving back to my childhood home of Whitefish, Montana, and opening my own business, LMC Jewelry Appraisal. It is so scary but so fun.”

This story about GIA certification appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story and photos by Jim Brace-Thompson.

The post How to Get a GIA Certification first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Exactly what are the lapidary arts? Succinctly put, lapidary arts are the activities involved with shaping stones, minerals and gems into decorative items such as cabochons and faceted gems.

Access = Growth

I have been playing and working in the lapidary world for the past ten years. I facet, cab and carve gemstones, sell rough materials to other lapidary artists, teach faceting and carving, along with selling ULTRA TEC faceting machines. From 1988 to 2000, I worked as a researcher and developer on the National Science Foundation project that kickstarted the birth of the Internet. I am seeing parallels between the amazing digital communications paradigm shift and the lapidary arts’ evolution. The internet is the main catalyst driving the current renaissance of lapidary arts. The other major factors propelling lapidary arts forward are design software, new equipment and materials, and the ability for people to work from home – a unique opportunity for growth in our industry.

Now information is at our fingertips and traveling to buy rough stones and lapidary materials is a luxury and an adventure. People can travel to the Bolivia mine to buy the world’s finest ametrine for gemstone faceting, but they can alternately receive photos, videos, descriptions, and pricing via WhatsApp minutes after a request. Payment takes just seconds and a purchase can be delivered in days. This replaces the old mine-to-broker-to-exporter-to-importer-to-broker-to-gemstone cutter system and negates the additional markup of price for each of these hand-offs. Being able to conduct business online is significant because it provides lapidary artists and jewelers quick, affordable, and easy access to gemstones and rough from around the world.

Learning & Sharing

Previous generations of cutters were constrained to years of training through the apprenticeship model of instruction. The internet has freed newcomers by providing access to most of the information needed to get started and the ability to purchase the necessary materials. On a personal note, I can provide remote video faceting training globally. Follow-up questions are answered via email text and messaging. Although in-studio lessons are superior, the ability to provide a live video lesson brings the cost of learning gemstone faceting down significantly.

We can share information easily, but that does not mean that it happens. As with most trades, crafts, and artistic endeavors, processes and techniques have often been secretive. I see that the new generation of lapidary artists is more willing to share their knowledge with colleagues and beginners. We are starting to understand that knowledge is power, but only when it is shared. Social media provides rapid sharing and co-development of ideas, allowing quick development of new designs, techniques, and collaborations.

Selling Online

Easily available e-commerce gives stone dealers, cutters, and jewelers the ability to sell their materials online. Using social media, we have been able to create profitable and growing businesses. We no longer have to own a physical storefront, visit jewelry store clients, or attend gem and mineral shows. In four years, I was able to amass 60,000 followers on Instagram and Facebook. The result of this social media growth translates into my gemstone faceting business being booked nine months out. The cost of presenting and selling my finished lapidary creations is now at a minimum. My faceting students can set up and sell their gemstones six months after their first lesson with minimal sales infrastructure investment.

Digital Lapidary Design

The digital benefits of lapidary are not limited to information and commerce. Over the past years, gemstone designers have used computers to calculate the mathematical equations and geometry necessary to both improve and create better-performing and spectacular gemstones. Robert Wood Strickland developed the GemCad and GemRay programs that allow any gemstone cutter to use a computer to design and optimize their gemstone creations. The recent addition of the Gem Cut Studio has made creating gemstone designs available to anyone who has a computer, the time to read the manual, and a commitment to practice. All the basics of math, geometry, and gemstone attributes (such as material hardness and refractive indexes) have been put in the CAD (Computer-Aided Design) programs. The programs/apps shorten the learning curve in gemstone design by months if not years. Of course, knowing the basic principles of these disciplines is beneficial, but no longer an obstacle to generating cutting-edge designs. These programs are tools that put current cutters years ahead of their predecessors.

Precision Lapidary Tools & Materials

Newly developed precision tools have allowed artists to work faster, more accurately, and with finer detail. There are also new materials such as better abrasives for faceting, cabbing, and carving all varieties of rocks and gems. In addition, cutters are using instruments made for different media in their lapidary work. In Henry Hunt’s book, “American Lapidary, Designing the Carved Gemstone,” the author claims that in any artistic endeavor, originality follows the introduction of new tools and techniques. With this break from tradition, we are seeing the new generation of lapidary artists developing new processes and techniques that are innovative and exciting.

An Exciting Future for Lapidary Work

All of these innovations and advancements put new and young individuals looking to create their own lapidary art business in a unique and advantageous position. The ability to build one’s own business is a catalyst in the evolution of the lapidary arts.

We have a new generation of craftspeople and artists who grew up understanding and applying the components of this digital and readily accessible world. They find more rewarding and meaningful employment with the freedom to define their lives on their own terms. The recent development of accessible individual health care and the stay-at-home mentality that COVID-19 instilled also advanced this new breed of independent workers. These shifts enabled people to work at their home studios and within a new business model. Lapidary artists can make and sell whatever they want and whenever they want and are no longer restricted by a brick-and-mortar store, corporate structure, or marketing research reports.

Driven by Industry Pioneers

A renaissance is driven by a group of pioneers. There are dozens of lapidary artists, engineers, and free thinkers who have laid the path for the new generation of lapidary artists. It’s worth your time to look at some of the groundbreaking lapidary artists in the United States. Enjoy their creations and get inspired.

Years from now, when the next generation of lapidary artists looks back at this era of lapidary advancement, I hope that they see what I am seeing – a revolution, an evolution, and a renaissance. This is what happens when advanced technology, global trade, instant communications, social media e-commerce, and a new generational shift of the paradigm exists. I invite you to be aware, open your eyes, seek out, and enjoy the magnificent and wondrous creations of our contemporary lapidary artists during these innovative times.

This story about a lapidary renaissance appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Mark Oros.

The post Exploring a Lapidary Renaissance first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

While viewing the front of the Brazilian agate slab, I spotted a much more interesting group of features that I could use to enhance the overall aesthetic of the piece. A three-inch circle would allow me to bring out all of the best patterns that the piece could offer. I sketched the circle and added a curved feature on the top so I could drill a hole for suspending the piece as a pendant.

Where do I get my project inspiration? First, this column pushes me out of my usual cab shape routine and into using different materials, shapes, textures, patterns or colors. I read a lot of books on lapidary and jewelry design and also subscribe to a couple of magazines that have current jewelry styles and materials such as blue gems and minerals. Sorting through my multiple boxes of slabs often triggers my imagination too.

MAKING THE SHAPE

Before and during grinding, I make sure to follow proper lapidary safety precautions. While grinding the piece to a preformed shape, I used a one-inch diameter Mizzy silicon carbide wheel run dry to shape the inside curves on the top section. I drew a line halfway up the girdle as a guide for shaping the dome of the cab. I used an ultra-fine Sharpie felt tip pen to draw the line.

After I finished shaping and sanding the front of the Brazilian agate cab, I turned it over and focused on the translucent area. It was to be enhanced and ultimately be the main focus of the cab. From the start, I intended to drill four holes in the back of the cab so they would show through from the front. I drew a curved line in the center of the translucent area so I could lay out the position of the four holes. (It gives more visual interest if the holes aren’t in a straight line and if they are varied in size from larger to smaller.) I also made sure that they were evenly spaced between the holes.

DRILLING & FINISHING

I drilled small pilot holes for each bit and placed the bits in these holes to verify the correct spacing. I started drilling with a small coarse diamond bit. To get the best drilling action on the bits, I turned them on their sides. If you try drilling by placing the bit vertically, the very center of the bit does no work because it is spinning in one spot. By placing it sideways, the diamonds in the bit sweep across the cab and remove material.

I gradually stepped up in bit size and grit size until I reached the desired hole size. Because I wanted to ensure that the holes were highly visible from the front I drilled the holes up to 1mm from the front of the cab. I used an inside caliper to measure the 1mm depth. The final grinding step involved using a very large bit to chamfer the top edge of the hole to remove any chips.

The finishing steps were done with shaped wood bits using 220 and 400-grit tumbling media followed by shaped wood bits and cerium oxide polish.

The finished Brazilian agate piece came out much better than I had expected!

This story about Brazilian agate appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Bob Rush.

Step By Step

The post Brazilian Agate Inspiration first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Throughout history, the precious metals gold and silver have been admired for their beauty, hoarded for their value, coveted for their workability, fashioned into jewelry, and coined as currency. But the story of platinum metal is much different. It was once cursed, discarded as worthless and used as a counterfeiting agent.

Platinum Metal

Platinum is a rare, silvery-white metal. Its specific gravity of 21.45 and Mohs hardness of 4.0 make it somewhat more dense and much harder than gold. Although not as quite as inert as gold, it nevertheless does not oxidize, retaining its gleaming, white metallic luster and taking a superb polish. Platinum also has excellent electrical conductivity, corrosion resistance, and catalytic properties, plus a high melting point. Platinum is about as rare as gold but, unlike gold, it is rarely found in economic concentrations suitable for mining. Platinum occurs in some 20 minerals and is also found in nature, usually as silvery-gray grains and nuggets.

Platina

In the early 1500s, Spain’s colonial gold miners, in what is now Colombia, found platinum in gold placers. They roundly cursed this discovery because the metal then had neither use nor value and was difficult to separate from gold. The Spanish named the metal platina, a derogatory term meaning “little silver” and the root of our English word “platinum.” In the early 1600s, Spanish mint workers at the future site of Bogotá, Colombia, dumped large amounts of worthless platina into rivers to create extraordinarily rich placer deposits that would end up being mined centuries later. In 1670, Spanish metallurgists found platina’s first practical use as an alloying agent to enhance the hardness and durability of bronze cannon.

In 1700, metallurgists learned that gold alloyed with platina changed very little in weight or color. Spanish mint workers subsequently began adulterating gold coins with platina and pocketing the displaced gold. To suppress this rampant counterfeiting, the Spanish Crown banned private possession of platina under penalty of death. But when counterfeiting continued, it began offering a bounty for all platina turned in, giving the metal its first formal valuation. The Crown later secretly debased its own gold coinage with platina, using these “special” issues to settle foreign debts.

The Russian Experience

In 1824, Russian gold prospectors in the Ural Mountains discovered the rich Nizhne-Tagilsk platinum placers. The Russian government quickly monopolized platinum mining and refining, then began fabricating platinum jewelry which consumers promptly rejected as a cheap “silver imitation.” Determined to benefit from its platinum, the Russian government next issued legal-tender, platinum ruble coins. But by 1843, the number of circulating platinum rubles had far exceeded the official mint issues because European counterfeiters had been acquiring worthless Colombian platina and striking counterfeit rubles.

Coming of Age

During the 1850s, European scientists took advantage of platinum’s high melting point and chemical inertness to fabricate high-quality laboratory instruments and crucibles. Growing demand soon drove platinum’s price to $1.50 per troy ounce, higher than that of silver. By the 1890s, platinum’s extraordinary catalytic properties that accelerated many chemical reactions had made it the standard catalyst for acid manufacturing and petroleum “cracking.”

At the same time, platinum gained popularity as a jewelry metal when prestigious designers Louis Cartier, Charles Lewis Tiffany and Peter Carl Fabergé began combining platinum’s brilliant, white gleam with the glitter of diamonds and sapphires. By 1905, combined jewelry and industrial demand had driven platinum’s price above that of gold (then $20.67 per troy ounce) for the first time. Breaking the gold-price “barrier” earned platinum worldwide acceptance as a bona fide precious metal.

Industrial Platinum Metal

Platinum demand soared in the 1970s when federally mandated reductions in automotive-exhaust emissions required new automobiles to be equipped with catalytic converters to break down noxious hydrocarbons and nitrous oxides. Today’s automotive converters contain about one-half a troy ounce of platinum in a ceramic honeycomb called “autocatalyst,” which is currently the biggest use of platinum. Eight million troy ounces of platinum are now mined each year, mostly in South Africa and Russia, with lesser amounts recovered in Canada and the United States. The United States’ production comes almost entirely from Montana’s underground Stillwater Mine.

Jewelry Platinum Metal

About 1.5 million troy ounces of 85-to-95- percent-pure platinum are made into jewelry each year. Platinum purity, expressed in parts per thousand, is stated in hallmarks similar to gold karat marks. A “Pt950” or “Plat950” hallmark indicates a composition of 95 percent platinum; the remaining five percent is usually copper or palladium which enhances workability. Platinum’s white gleam complements or contrasts nicely with both colorless and colored gemstones. Popular composite jewelry creations combine the rich yellow of gold with the gleaming white of platinum—a fitting combination for a metal that, in less than 120 years, has gone from rags to riches.

This story about platinum appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Steve Voynick.

The post Platinum Metal’s Rise to Fame first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

This stone, paradoxically celebrated for its beauty yet feared for its curse, is the Hope Diamond. The size of a walnut and a deep blue gem in color, it is the world’s best-known diamond. Over its 370-year-long, often murky history, it has become immersed in legend, stolen at least twice and cut four times. Its owners have included sultans, kings, bankers, jewelers, thieves, a popular stage performer, and a fabulously wealthy heiress.

Since 1958, the Hope Diamond has been a major attraction at the National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution) in Washington D.C., where it has been viewed by more than 100 million visitors and is currently valued at over $250 million.

Plucked From the Eye of an Idol

The Hope Diamond’s strange story began in 1653 when French gem merchant Jean-Baptiste Tavernier visited India’s Golconda Sultanate. There he purchased a crudely cut, triangular, flat, blue diamond of extraordinary size—115 carats. According to legend, this diamond, now known as the “Tavernier Diamond,” had been cursed since it previously had been plucked from the eye of a statue of a Hindu idol.

After returning to Europe in 1668, Tavernier sold the diamond to King Louis XIV of France, who ordered the stone recut. Tavernier wrote extensively about the gem before his death in Moscow the following year—when he was reportedly dismembered by a pack of wild dogs.

The “French Blue” and the Guillotine

The 1691 French crown jewel inventory describes the recut stone as “a very big, violet (the period term for “blue”) diamond, thick, cut with facets on both sides and in the shape of a heart with eight main faces.” It weighed 67.1 carats and was valued at the equivalent of $4 million in 2023 dollars. Formally known as the Blue Diamond of the Crown of France and popularly as the “French Blue,” this smaller stone, with its enhanced symmetry and additional pavilion facets, was substantially more brilliant than the original Tavernier Diamond. The French Blue was likely the first large diamond to be cut in a modern brilliant style.

Louis XIV had the blue diamond, along with a 117-carat red spinel and 195 smaller diamonds, set in an elaborate pendant that symbolized the Order of the Golden Fleece, a Catholic order of chivalry. Despite this prestigious setting, the idea that the French Blue was cursed gained credibility with the misfortunes of Louis XIV. Five of his legitimate children died in infancy. And the king himself died in agony of gangrene in 1715.

Setting the Stage

Ownership of the French Blue then passed to Louis XV, a monarch who enjoyed great popularity early in his reign—but his good fortune did not last. He engaged in costly wars that drained the French treasury, weakened royal authority, and set the stage for the French Revolution. Louis XV died a hated man in 1774.

The French Blue then became the property of King Louis XVI and his wife, the infamous Marie Antoinette, both of whom often wore the stone. But when the French Revolution erupted in 1789, the monarchy fell and, in September 1792, Louis was beheaded in a public execution. Marie Antoinette also died at the guillotine four months later.

A Convoluted Trail

During the French Revolution, the blue diamond, now widely believed to be cursed, was stolen from a royal warehouse and never seen again, at least not as the French Blue. The history of the stone then became uncertain. In 1812, just as the statute of limitations regarding the theft took effect, a 45-carat blue diamond appeared in the hands of London diamond merchant Daniel Eliason. Amid widespread accusations that this diamond was actually a cut-down version of the stolen French Blue, Eliason committed suicide.

In 1820, Britain’s King George IV acquired the diamond. Following his death in 1830, his bankrupt estate sold the stone to pay off debts. Attention then shifted to London banking heir Henry Philip Hope, who some suspected had secretly bought the diamond from French thieves in the early 1800s. Hope publicly listed the stone in his 1839 gem catalog—only to die just months later.

The Hope Diamond

The blue diamond remained with the Hope family for the next 57 years, the last owner being the American actress, playwright, and concert-hall singer May Yohé (Mary Augusta Yohé, Lady Francis Hope), whose writings and stage productions often called attention to the stone’s purported curse. The diamond was sold in 1896 to settle Yohé’s pressing debts. Many believed that the celebrated singer herself fell victim to the stone’s evil power: After enduring two disastrous marriages, she died in poverty in 1938.

The blue diamond, now known as the “Hope Diamond,” next passed through the hands of several gem merchants and jewelers, and two Ottoman sultans. The stone was then acquired by the prestigious Paris jewelry firm Cartier and director Pierre Cartier, a renowned wheeler-dealer in the gem world, who immediately began seeking a buyer and a quick profit.

On to America

The story of how the Hope Diamond came to the United States began in 1896 in the gold-mining camp of Ouray, Colorado, where prospector Thomas F. Walsh bought two abandoned claims for back taxes. This purchase turned out to be one of history’s greatest bargains, for the original claim owners had somehow overlooked a massive deposit of phenomenally rich gold ore.

In 1898, Walsh’s daughter Evalyn married Edward “Ned” Beale McLean, heir to The Washington Post newspaper fortune, and became an internationally known socialite with lavish tastes, especially for fine gems. When Thomas Walsh died in 1910, he left his fortune of $3 million ($90 million in 2023 dollars) to his 24-year-old daughter Evalyn Walsh McLean.

Pierre Cartier

Having previously sold fine gems to Evalyn, Pierre Cartier knew that the heiress, now in receipt of her fortune, was a prime candidate to buy the Hope Diamond. Pierre’s first attempt to sell her the stone failed. But he tried again, this time with the diamond set in a striking modern mount surrounded by a three-tiered circlet of dozens of smaller white diamonds.

Also astutely guessing that Evalyn would be fascinated by the stone’s purported curse, Pierre recounted—and likely embellished— its more disturbing details. In 1911, amid great publicity, Evalyn bought the Hope Diamond for $300,000 ($9 million in 2023 dollars). Enamored of the stone, the heiress frequently wore it at balls and parties, at times hanging it around the neck of her Great Dane or hiding it in the furniture and challenging her guests to “find the Hope.”

But in the end, Evalyn also seems to have paid dearly for owning the Hope Diamond: Her husband died in a mental hospital, her firstborn son was fatally struck by an automobile at age nine, and her 24-year-old daughter died of an overdose of sleeping pills.

Harry Winston & The Smithsonian

In 1947, New York City diamond merchant Harry Winston purchased the Hope Diamond from Evalyn Walsh McLean’s estate.

For nearly a decade, Winston displayed the stone on his popular “Court of Jewels” tour across North America, showing it at charity balls and on television shows. He ordered a minor recutting of the stone’s pavilion facets to further increase its brilliance—the fourth and last time that the Hope would be cut.

In the mid-1950s, mineralogist George Switzer, an associate curator at the National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian), proposed establishing a national gem collection with the Hope Diamond as the centerpiece. Switzer asked Harry Winston to donate the stone to the Smithsonian. In 1958, Winston, intrigued by the idea of a national gem collection and perhaps even more so by a monumental tax write-off, agreed.

Winston sent the Hope Diamond from New York City to the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., by registered, insured first-class mail. And what happened next convinced many that the Hope’s curse was still alive. Shortly after hand-delivering the stone, United States Post Office letter carrier James Todd was seriously injured in two back-to-back automobile accidents—before losing his house to a fire.

New Look at an Old Stone

For centuries, no conclusive proof existed that the Hope Diamond had been cut from the French Blue, or that the latter had been cut from the Tavernier Diamond. But in 2007, a Paris museum curator discovered a lead cast of the French Blue from which researchers prepared a three-dimensional, digital image. Comparisons with images of the Hope Diamond proved that the Hope had indeed been cut from the French Blue.

Researchers then computer-imaged the Tavernier Diamond based on Jean-Baptiste Tavernier’s detailed drawings from the late 1660s. Image comparisons confirmed that both the Hope Diamond and the French Blue had once been the Tavernier Diamond

A museum cataloging label also indicated that the lead cast of the French Blue dated to 1812 when the stone’s owner was a “Mr. Hoppe of London,” strongly suggesting that Henry Philip Hope had acquired the diamond not long after its theft during the French Revolution, then recut it to disguise its identity to avoid a French repossession lawsuit. After apparently passing the diamond on to Daniel Eliason, Hope seems to have reacquired the stone 25 years later shortly before his death.

“Proof” of the Curse?

Researchers have also learned that the Hope Diamond, when exposed to shortwave ultraviolet light, glows like a burning red ember. While many blue diamonds exhibit this same fluorescence, none match the Hope’s fiery intensity. Gemologists attribute this unusual fluorescence to traces of boron that also produce the Hope’s distinctive blue color. This boron interacts with other trace impurities, enabling electrons within the stone’s crystal lattice to absorb energy from ultraviolet light, and then release it as visible red light.

While gemologists agree that this fluorescence adds to Hope’s uniqueness, intrigue, and mystery, others attribute its eerie red glow to a demonic presence.

Despite the dark legends that still surround the Hope, this celebrated blue diamond has certainly not cursed the Smithsonian, which has benefited enormously through worldwide attention along with substantially increased gifting and visitor attendance.

This story about the Hope Diamond curse previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Steve Voynick.

The post The Hope Diamond Curse first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Why Hand Polish?

Hand polishing is something even the most novice and/or youngest rockhound can easily do. It requires only a few materials, doesn’t cost much and results in beautifully polished stones. Some people find the rhythmic motion of hand polishing to be relaxing, offering almost a Zen-like experience. Using the Mohs Scale of Hardness, softer stones like turquoise and amber work best for hand polishing. These stones often don’t fare well in a tumbler anyway, which is one more reason to polish them by hand. 

How to Polish Rocks

Step 1

Start by cleaning the rock(s) by hand. Fill a small bucket with hot, soapy water to clean off dirt. If the stone has a lot of crevices or stubborn residue, an old toothbrush works wonders. Once the rock is thoroughly cleaned, rinse off the soap, then throw out the soapy water and refill the bucket with clean water to use throughout the process.

Step 2

Round the corners and do some rough shaping with 220-grit sandpaper. Begin by moistening the sandpaper and placing it grit-side up on a cutting board or other hard, flat surface. Wet the rock, hold it in your dominant hand and begin rubbing it along the sandpaper to remove the hard edges. Continuously wet the rock to remove fine particles and continue the sanding process until the edges become smooth and rounded or you achieve the desired shape.

To shape and polish harder substances, opt for something coarser. Some people begin with an 80-grit, but sandpaper this coarse shouldn’t be used on softer stones because it could add more scratches than remove. A quick reminder – the lower the number, the coarser the sandpaper.

Step 3

Refine the shape and remove heavy scratches with 500-grit sandpaper. Moving up to finer sandpaper helps remove significant scratches and helps further refine the shape. Keep the rock wet throughout the sanding process for better results.

Step 4

Remove lighter scratches and begin polishing with 1200-grit sandpaper. Using extra-fine sandpaper buffs out tiny scratches on the stone’s surface. The shine will start forming during this step. Make sure to keep the rock wet, rinsing it often to expose anything that’s been missed. 

Step 5

Dampen a square of thick cloth, preferably denim or similar material, and add a good dab of toothpaste. Work the stone through the toothpaste and over the fabric to create a beautiful luster. Depending on the stone, add more toothpaste several times until the desired shine is achieved.

“There are lots of polishing compounds out there,” said Allen McGhee, long-time rockhound and hand polisher. “But I’ve found that toothpaste works just as well, and it’s cheaper. Pretty much any toothpaste works, so don’t buy the high-priced ones.”

Step 6

Rinse off the toothpaste and coat the newly polished stone with mineral oil or a commercial rock polish to bring out the luster. Once the rock dries, it’s ready to show off.

Augmenting with a Dremel

A Dremel is a popular motorized rotary tool that’s handy for grinding and smoothing sharp edges and completing extensive shaping of hard stones, especially those with lots of crevices.

“You can shape and polish rocks and gems faster with a Dremel if you want,” said McGhee. “They make heads for them with all three levels of grit you need.”

When using a Dremel, protective eyewear is a must. Even small chips can damage an eye. Gloves should be used to protect hands. Sharp edges on the rock and the rotating tip of the Dremel can break the skin. Wearing a mask prevents inhaling the tiny particles coming off the rock as it is ground. 

Using a Dremel comes down to personal preference. Some prefer a more natural shape, so they do very little shaping but want to give their rocks a nice bit of shine. Alternately, a Dremel comes in handy for a perfectly smooth and/or rounded stone or for harder rocks that will take a long time to smooth by hand. 

Tumbling Vs. Hand Polishing

Many people inadvertently think rock tumblers offer the fastest way to polish rocks. In reality, rock tumbling is a lengthy process that generally takes anywhere from several days to several weeks. The larger and harder the rocks, the more time tumbling takes. Hand polishing offers a quick turnaround for softer rocks. 

On the other hand, rock tumbling is less labor-intensive since the machine does all the hard work.

Merits of Polishing Rocks by Hand

Although hand polishing can be time-consuming based on the hardness of the rock, it gives more control over the finished product. This control can be especially important if the final result will impact the quality, value and/or overall appearance of a rare or expensive rock or gem. Hand polishing can also give a desirable sense of accomplishment. 

This story about how to polish rocks previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Moira K. McGhee.

The post How to Polish Rocks by Hand first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Many of us have some level of barely started or otherwise unfinished projects stashed away in our studio or shop waiting for the idea or motivation to work on them. Usually, I make my cabs somewhat larger for displaying at shows. I don’t often make my cabs for jewelry use, but this month’s jewelry theme gave me an excuse to resurrect a long-buried, but not forgotten project. 

After struggling to remember what I did with a particular pair of preforms five years ago, I found them together surprisingly quickly. The intended design was to have one piece nested into the larger one. The larger one is a slab of Brazilian agate with contrasting color bands. The smaller piece is a small cab of Laguna agate.

Making the Cabochon

I started with shaping the Brazilian agate slab into a semi-circle with an inverted curve in the bottom to accommodate the smaller cab. I also sketched a design at the top so I could carve a tab that I could drill through for stringing the piece on as a necklace. I shaped the Laguna agate into a pointed teardrop shape sized to fit into the bottom of the larger cab.

I shaped the curve in the larger piece with a silicon carbide Mizzy wheel. The Brazilian agate piece was ready for carving the ridges across the face. I started carving the ridges in the face of the Brazilian agate with a small diamond wheel. I followed this by enlarging and shaping the grooves with a shaped Mizzy wheel. The next step involved sanding the groves with a shaped 220-grit silicon carbide sanding block. The final sanding was done with various shapes of wood bits and a slurry of 220-grit tumbling media. The polishing was done with shaped wood bits and a slurry of cerium oxide.

I drilled the inside curve on the bottom of the Brazilian agate and the top of the Laguna agate cab with a 1mm diamond core drill so I could install a silver wire loop in each of the holes.  I used Epoxy 330 to glue the wire loops into the stones. I assembled the stone pieces by connecting the silver loops. I’m pleased with how the project turned out. 

Steps by Photo

This story about cabochons for jewelry making previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Bob Rush.

The post Cabochons for Jewelry Making first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

“Under the rocks and stones, there is water underground.” ~ Talking Heads

The answer lies in (among other places) the lyrics of the 1970’s art rock band, Talking Heads: Water.

Rock Tumbling Blow Up

Rock tumbling began millions of years ago, as waves and streams tumbled Earth’s first sediments. Over time, the more ingenious of our ancestors discerned how such natural processes shaped and smoothed some rocks more than others. Moving water became the first “rock tumbler.”  

For thousands of years we have respected the power of water but only recently has science explained how something so benign and malleable can wear away stone.

In April 2022, a first-of-its-kind study, led by University of Minnesota-Twin Cities researchers, announced it had taken a closer look at how water erodes hard surfaces and concluded that tiny droplets behave like miniature bombs. 

“There are similar sayings in Eastern and Western cultures that ‘dripping water hollows out stone,’” said Xiang Cheng, senior author of the research paper and associate professor at the University of Minnesota Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science. 

“Such sayings intend to teach a moral lesson: ‘Even if you are weak if you do something continuously, you will make an impact.’ But when you have something so soft as droplets hitting something so hard as rocks, you cannot help wondering, ‘Why does the drop impact cause damage?’ That question motivated our research.”

Their discovery, published in Nature Communications, outlined how a new technique called high-speed stress microscopy measured the force, stress, and pressure underneath liquid drops as they hit a surface. They found that the force exerted by a droplet spreads out with the impacting drop instead of concentrating in the center of the droplet, briefly exceeding the speed of sound as it spreads and creating a miniature “shock wave” across an impacted surface.

“Each droplet,” the team noted, “behaves like a small bomb, releasing its impact energy explosively and giving it the force necessary to erode surfaces over time.” 

And to think, all those micro-bombs were organically exploding as Egyptian slaves slushed rough-hewn rocks, for months at a time, in troughs filled with sand and water. Or, as Indian lapidaries rolled goat skin polishing bags filled with water and grit along the ground, or shook jars of water, abrasives, and pre-cut beads up and down on pre-tumbler “teeter-totter” boards. 

Rock Tumbling Glow Up

That said, not every type of stone is up to the task of enduring microscopic bombings in pursuit of that perfect shine.

“We were the first in the area to carry raw stones because it was growing more popular. People want to tumble their stones,” says Christine Seebold, evidential medium and owner of the Mind Body Spirit Center, with locations in Albany, Clifton Park, and Saratoga Springs, New York. 

“We try to give everyone a variety of stones to try, plus we do a rock tumbling kit for kids, which includes two dozen of the best basic choices.”

What makes the best basic choice? A great place to start is at that tried and true standard established in 1812 by German mineralogist, Friedrich Mohs. He chose 10 different minerals of varying degrees of hardness and assigned them a score of one (softest) to 10 (hardest). 

The ideal Mohs scale of hardness for rock tumbling success is between five to seven. One of the tumbling’s easiest tips to remember is ‘seven days for a hardness of seven,’ and standard rock tumbling instructions are generally based on material with a Mohs hardness of about seven (including agate, chalcedony, jasper, quartz, and petrified wood).

In Why Mohs Hardness Is Important, Hobart M. King of Rocktumbler.com wrote, that if you are tumbling a rough with a hardness of six, it will not take as long to shape and smooth as a rough with a hardness of seven. “Our opinion is that you can reduce the number of tumbling days by about one-and-a-half days for every degree of hardness under seven.”

Agate, Chalcedony, and Jasper, Oh Mohs!

Quartz is the benchmark mineral for a seven on the Mohs Hardness Scale and standing toe to toe with it is another top choice for tumbling, chalcedony. 

Don’t let its occasional delicate transparency and a wide variety of hues (thanks to impurities in an otherwise colorless state) fool you. Chalcedony can roll with the best of them and is the generic name for any kind of microcrystalline quartz, although its white and blue forms are most often referred to as chalcedony. (Fun fact: it’s also the “flint” used in ancient tools and weaponry.) 

Agate and jasper are varieties of chalcedony. All are colorful, durable, inexpensive, and deliver a satisfying luster after tumbling. An easy way to remember one from the other is that agate is any type of chalcedony that is translucent; jasper is chalcedony that is opaque, thanks to a greater degree of impurities mixed with its silica/quartz. Agate and jasper can form in the same volcanic environment so it’s not uncommon for a single rock to contain both translucent (agate) and opaque (jasper) portions.

Polished agate as ornamentation dates back to the Bronze Age (3300 BCE – 1300 B.C.) in Asia, and third-century B.C. Greece, it derived its name from naturalist Theophrastus, who named agate after the Sicilian shoreline of the Achates River where he found the stones. Popular agates include descriptive lace and moss agates, turritella (including petrified wood), and iridescent fire agate.

Varieties of jasper include imperial (green), the rarest — according to writer and rock seeker Jeremy Hall — so be sure of what you’re buying; brecciated (colorful red and yellow nodules); the dreamlike landscape; poppy, named for its distinctive tiny “blooms,” and ocean, found only at low tide in Madagascar.

Other types of chalcedony to consider for tumbling are aventurine, whose tiny inclusions look like shimmering flakes; carnelian and heliotrope (aka “bloodstone”); blue (Mt. Airy Blues or Mohave) or slightly lavender chalcedony, known as holly blue and found only in Oregon; and since the organic matter in petrified wood is often replaced by (opaque) chalcedony, it can technically be classified as jasper (and tumbles at roughly the same rate, four to five weeks, as agate or jasper).

Christine says other rocks her collectors love to tumble are quartz and tiger’s eye. Tiger’s eye, a crystalline type of quartz, can be polished to a high luster but experienced tumblers warn that tumbling pieces larger than an inch in size can result in “bruising” along the edges of the rocks, caused by quartz-on-quartz impacts inside a tumbling barrel.

Your best prospects are hard, dense, and smooth rocks like those mentioned above; avoid tumbling rocks with a gritty texture or that prove too soft after a “scratch test” (where a mineral, after being scratched by another mineral, will fall on the Mohs Hardness Scale).

Rockin’ Tik Tok

What’s hot in rocks is also being determined by younger, more social voices.

“We have kids come in the store educating their parents,” says Christine. “TikTok videos are teaching a lot of kids about stones and crystals. By the time they come in the store, they already know what they’re looking at and what they want. They say, ‘This way, Mom.’ They already know the stones they want.”

Driving popularity can also drive demand for certain rocks.

“Muldovite,” sighs Christine, citing a recent example of a rock so popular (thanks to TikTok) that it was hard to keep in stock or, from a metaphysical standpoint, align with the right energies.

“This is a really intense stone of transformation and spiritual awakening,” she says of the rare green tektite from the Czech Republic. “I had three people in one week come into my shop asking for it, and when I asked, ‘Are you sure? That’s a strong stone,’ they said, ‘Yes. We saw it on TikTok.’”

She’s not exaggerating. An April 30, 2021 article in Cosmopolitan by Rebekah Harding cited how muldovite, during the pandemic, racked up more than 280 million views on TikTok and its digital spiritual cousin, WitchTok. 

“There’s a neat reason this tektite became one of WitchTok’s biggest and most long-lived trends,” Harding wrote. “Moldavite removes blockages and obstacles on your path toward becoming your highest self. Often in the most chaotic way possible.”

So, muses Christine,  “If you can’t find a certain stone, it might be because it is selling out on TikTok as ‘Stone of the Week!’” 

TikTok trends are a long way from the days of goatskin bags and sand-filled troughs, and yet the attraction we feel for a pretty, shiny stone endures.   

This story about rock tumbling previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by L. A. Sokolowski.

The post Best Rock Tumbling Rocks first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Almost everyone interested in gemstones, whether from the gemological, historical or metaphysical perspectives, has read, or at least heard of, George Frederick Kunz’s book The Curious Lore of Precious Stones. Published 110 years ago, this classic is still being reprinted today.

Over his long career, Kunz would introduce jewelers to semiprecious colored gems; write more than 400 gem-related articles, books and reports; assemble world-class mineral collections; cofound the nation’s oldest mineral club; and compile the first formal accounts of birthstones and the metaphysical aspects of gems. Impressive achievements for a largely self-educated man.

The Young Rockhound

As a teenager in Manhattan and nearby Hoboken, New Jersey, Kunz collected minerals wherever he could find them, often at bridge and railroad construction sites. After attending public schools, he took night classes at Manhattan’s Cooper Institute, although he did not graduate. Despite being limited in his formal education, he read everything available about minerals to complement his already proficient field-collecting skills.

Kunz was still a teenager when he sold his 4,000-specimen mineral collection to the University of Minnesota for $400 ($8,000 in 2023 dollars). He later wrote that the sale wasn’t “so much for the money but to mark myself in the eyes of the world as a real collector.”

Tiffany & Co.

In the 1870s, American and European jewelers focused mainly on the “big four” gems — diamonds, rubies, sapphires and emeralds. Kunz, however, was more interested in semiprecious gemstones or, as he later wrote, the “sea-green depths of tourmaline, the watery-blue of aquamarine, the red blood-cups of garnet, the misty nebula of moonstone.”

At that time, the nation’s most prestigious jeweler was then New York City’s Tiffany & Co. Founded by Charles Lewis Tiffany in 1837, the company dealt exclusively in the “big four” gems. But that began to change in 1875 when 19-year-old Kunz showed Tiffany a fine specimen of green tourmaline, then persuaded the jeweler to buy it, cut it into gems and fashion an experimental line of jewelry. To Tiffany’s surprise, the collection quickly sold out.

Kunz’s meeting with Charles Tiffany was a turning point in America’s experience with gems. Gem fashions now changed rapidly once Tiffany introduced the public to semi-precious gemstone jewelry. In 1879, Tiffany hired Kunz as his gemstone expert, a position he would hold for the rest of his life. Kunz’s many responsibilities included finding sources of the semiprecious, colored gemstones that now captured his employer’s—and the public’s—attention.

George Frederick Kunz the Writer

Kunz began publishing gem-related articles in 1881. Two years later he wrote a report titled “American Gems and Precious Stones” for the United States Geological Survey’s (USGS) Mineral Resources of the United States, an annual, book-length publication.

Kunz’s reports on domestic gemstone discoveries and production for the USGS established the credibility of gemstones as a mineral resource and encouraged gemstone prospecting. Through these annual reports, Kunz also built a national network of correspondents that included prospectors, miners, geologists, mineralogists and mineral collectors. The USGS also appointed Kunz a “special agent” and regularly published his gemstone reports in Mineral Resources of the United States for 50 years.

In 1886, Kunz cofounded the New York Mineralogical Club. Still in existence today as the nation’s oldest, continuously active mineral club, the NYMC has been the model for the subsequent founding of hundreds of similar clubs across the nation. Kunz’s first book, Gems and Precious Stones of North America, published in 1890, utilized his research for his Mineral Resources of the United States reports.

The World-Class Collector

Through his work at Tiffany & Co., Kunz became acquainted with prestigious customers, among them the wealthy financier John Pierpont Morgan, a prominent collector of art, antiques and gemstones. In 1888, Morgan commissioned Kunz to assemble a gemstone collection for international exhibition. The 382-specimen collection that Kunz put together won two gold medals at the 1889 Exposition Universelle in Paris.

In 1891, jointly financed by Morgan and Tiffany, Kunz traveled to Russia’s Ural Mountains to locate mine sources of gemstones. While in the Urals, Kunz acquired a quantity of demantoid, the green variety of andradite and the rarest and most valuable of the garnet gemstones. He also purchased newly mined alexandrite, the color-change variety of chrysoberyl. Charles Tiffany’s later successful marketing of demantoid and alexandrite in his Art Noveau and Art Deco jewelry styles kept both stones from gemological obscurity.

In 1900, Morgan commissioned Kunz to assemble another world-class collection of gems and minerals—the 4,000-specimen Second Tiffany-Morgan Collection. The following year, Morgan, again relying on Kunz’s collecting expertise, paid $100,000 (roughly $2 million in 2023 dollars) to acquire Philadelphia industrialist Clarence S. Bement’s spectacular 12,300-specimen collection. Morgan later donated these Kunz-assembled collections to New York City’s American Museum of Natural History.

The Tiffany Yellow Diamond Soon after 23-year-old George Frederick Kunz began work at Tiffany & Co., he received a daunting assignment—to design and supervise the cutting of a 287.42-carat, canary-yellow, South African diamond that Charles Tiffany had purchased for $18,000 ($500,000 in 2023 dollars). Kunz and other experts studied the stone for a year before deciding on a modified, square-antique-brilliant cut with 82 facets, 24 more than the traditional 58-facet cut. Kunz’s unconventional and rather daring approach successfully maximized the stone’s brilliance. The resulting 128.54-carat gem, now famed as the “Tiffany Yellow Diamond” and valued at $30 million, has since been worn by only four women, among them actress Audrey Hepburn in a 1961 promotion for the movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s; Lady Gaga at the 2019 Academy Awards ceremony; and Beyoncé in a 2021 Tiffany & Co. advertisement. As part of the enduring legacy of George Frederick Kunz, this spectacular diamond has appeared in various settings and is permanently displayed at Tiffany’s flagship store in New York City.

Birthstones & the Metaphysical

In 1891, Tiffany & Co. published Kunz’s Natal Stones: Sentiments and Superstitions Connected with Precious Stones, which traced the ancient Biblical and Hindu origins of birthstones, and documented what had for centuries been only loose tradition. Although just 36 pages long, Natal Stones heightened public interest in birthstones and sharply increased sales of Tiffany’s birthstone jewelry. In 1912, the National Association of Jewelers of America formalized Kunz’s birthstone list. Tiffany & Co. regularly reprinted updated editions of Natal Stones until 1931; modern reprints continue to be available today.

Largely at Tiffany’s expense, Kunz amassed a huge, personal gemological library; while most of these volumes addressed the mineralogical aspects of gemstones, a significant number of rare works dealt with the historical, healing, occult, spiritual, religious and metaphysical aspects of gems.

In 1913, many of these volumes served as Kunz’s research base for The Curious Lore of Precious Stones, the first comprehensive treatment of gem lore. Widely marketed in North America and Great Britain, this enormously popular book boosted sales of gems and jewelry, and greatly stimulated interest in the metaphysical aspects of gems. Although first editions currently sell for as much as $1,000, affordable reprints are still sold today.

Yogo Sapphires & Kunzite

Prospectors, miners, jewelers and collectors often mailed Kunz specimens to identify. “It would perhaps seem improbable that, sitting at a desk in New York, one [could] discover a gem mine in Montana, yet that is just what happened to me,” Kunz later recalled. “. . . upon examination I found certain crystals to which little attention had been paid, but which I discovered to be fine blue sapphires.” Thanks to Kunz’s identification, Montana’s Yogo Gulch became the Western Hemisphere’s greatest source of gem sapphire.

Kunz also received a package of pinkish-purple, transparent crystals from a Pala, California, miner who needed help with identification. After Kunz identified the crystals as a new color variety of spodumene, members of the New York Academy of Science named this variety “kunzite” in Kunz’s honor.

In 1910, after identifying a violet-pink stone from Madagascar as a new color variety of beryl, Kunz named it “morganite” for his longtime friend and benefactor John Pierpont. Morgan.

Respect and Recognition

Kunz despised jewelers who took advantage of an unsuspecting public by passing off altered or look-alike gems as the real thing and enjoyed posing as an average jewelry customer. He was once shown a necklace with gems that the jeweler described as “exceptionally fine.”

“Really, well, after all, that’s not a high price for it—I paused, the dealer beamed—if it were genuine. I leaned over the table, lifted and dropped the necklace disdainfully. What do you mean asking such a price for a flagrant forgery?”

As Kunz’s notoriety grew, honorary degrees compensated for his lack of formal education. He received a master’s degree from New York City’s Columbia University; a doctor-of-philosophy degree from Germany’s University of Marburg; and a Ph.D. from Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. Kunz proudly used his academic designations in all his later articles and books.

In a 1928 interview with The Saturday Evening Post, Kunz explained what had sustained his interest in gems and minerals for more than 60 years: “Every boy has his passions—his collection of stamps or coins or marbles or what not, and the only difference between another boy’s and mine was that I never outgrew it.”

George Frederick Kunz’s Legacy

Kunz remained active with Tiffany & Co. until his death in 1932 at age 75. While making many contributions to the world of gems and minerals, Kunz had also succeeded financially. His estate was valued at $114,000—the equivalent of more than $2 million today.

Kunz’s bestowed his final gift posthumously in 1933 when his estate sold his personal gemological and mineralogical library of several thousand rare books, pamphlets and articles to the USGS for the token sum of one dollar. Today, the Kunz Collection is available to researchers at the USGS Library in Reston, Virginia.

Kunz’s obituary in Science magazine concluded with “. . . it is doubtful if [anyone] ever lived a richer or more interesting life.” And when it came to gemstones and gems, that was probably true. Interestingly, the word “gemologist” replaced the term “gem expert” almost immediately after Kunz’s death. That was fitting, for George Frederick Kunz, as America’s first gemologist, had advanced the world of gems culturally, commercially, scientifically, and metaphysically.

This story about George Frederick Kunz previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Steve Voynick.

The post Who is George Frederick Kunz? first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.

Faceting Different Versions

The Hoshi’s (Japanese for “star”) size and symmetry of facets on the crown and girdle provide the opportunity to add ornamental facets. I faceted two versions of Marco’s Hoshi for this article. The first one used the design provided and the second was embellished with frosted facets and concave girdle facets.

I jazz this design up a little differently each time I use it. I recommend faceting the design as seen in the faceting diagram first because the girdle is very different and the small crown facets need some time and finer grits to get lined up. Once you facet the diagram, then cut another, adding embellishments to it.

Gem Faceting – Two From One

I used the same piece of Ouro Verde quartz (AKA lemon quartz) rough for both gemstones to show the difference between the two styles in the same color. I did this by using a single longer gemstone that would normally be used for a long rectangle or briolette shape. I preformed the rough and then cut the gemstone in half, giving me two identical preforms. This is a good method for making matching earrings and using longer materials without waste.

I use the Hoshi design in my gemstone faceting lessons. The student facets a round brilliant design for their first gemstone. For the second gemstone, they select either Marco Voltolini’s Hoshi or Maya Drop design. Students get to decide how they want to embellish the gemstone by choosing different facet patterns and the shapes and placement of concave facets on the girdle. This allows the student to try frosting facets, use the ULTRA TEC Fantasy Machine and add their distinct personality.

Ouro Verde Quartz

I like to use Ouro Verde quartz for the majority of my small to medium test cuts. It is a beautiful and affordable gemstone rough that shows off the stone’s best attributes. I recommend my friends at Storied Gemstones when buying gemstone rough. When you call, please tell them I said hello!

If you have any questions about faceting this design or would like to make suggestions for future gemstone designs, please contact me at www.hashnustones.com and use the contact form.

This story about gem faceting the Hoshi gemstone design previously appeared in Rock & Gem magazine. Click here to subscribe. Story by Mark Oros.

The post Gem Faceting: Hoshi Design first appeared on Rock & Gem Magazine.