Cat's Eye Gemstones, Phenomenal stones

Phenomenal stones such as cat's eyes provide "eye stimulation" in that your eye balls actually follow the movement of your fingers as the "lines" on the gem moves with your every motion. Cat's eye effect or "chatoyancy" comes from the French word "chat" or "cat" and "o'eil" or "eye".

When cat's eye effect occur in stones which donot normally display chatoyancy, then the gem becomes doubly rare and more valuable. For example, a cat's eye ruby, cat's eye saphire, cat's eye garnet are gems not only rare but really a "one of a kind" collectors item.

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Jade Carving, Products, Clock, Bed, Chair and more

Imagine if you could fill your living room or house with Jade Carving, then what would be your choice?

Size does matter! Big, gigantic, enormous, heavy describes that few carvings listed here. From "jade" ships to urns carved from a single piece of fine jade boulder to furniture fit for an Emperor! Click here to take your pick and fill up your living room >>>

Gemstone Online - Danburite, Cut Danburite

Danburite is a crystalline mineral similar to topaz and CaB2Si2O8 is the chemical formula, Orthorhombic in crystal character, Refractive Index is 1.622-1.670; Birefrigence is 0.044-0.047. Danburite can be used in jewelry due to its hardness and durability. Bright yellow one are desirable and often cut into gems. Colorless ones are more common. You can find danburites in Myanmar, Mexico, Japan, Madagascar, USA and Russia Mogok in Burma (Myanmar) produces exceptionally fine straw yellow to bright yellow mineral specimens and cut gemstones of danburite which is usually a colorless stone. Read full story >>>

Gemstone Online, Burmese Gems

Here are some of our popular collections of Burmese gems to buy online. See the interesting Cut Burmese Ruby Heated, Star Bluish-Violet Sapphire, Cut Spinel, Facetted Color Change Hackmanite and Cut Mogok Spessartite Garnet. For more information, please visit www.gemwow.com

Topaz

Chemical formula: Al2SiO4(F9OH)2 + Cr Hardness: 8 Cleavage: Perfect basal ( one direction). Fracture-conchoidal. Brittle. Luster: vitreous Crystal habbit: Orthorhombic. Prismatic, well formed, water worn pebbles, stimpy, very large, granular Density: 3.57-3.57 Occurs in dark yellow, light yellow, brown, pale blue, dark rose red, pink, lilac, brown, yellow brown, gray brown, green, light green, colorless Sources: Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Burma, Brazil, Russia, Pakistan, Utah, Australia, Namibia, Zimbabwe, China Most of the blue topaz seen in jewelry nowadays have been treated with cobalt 60, electrons or neutron atomic particles to create a blue color.

Sky blue being a lighter shade resembling a "sky blue" at noon on a clear day, Swiss blue is more intense almost neon like, while London blue has a bluish darker inkish cast. Prices of irradiated blue topaz has come down to a few dollar and cents per carat due to over production.

You can own a piece for a few to tens of dollars for a very nice piece. Precious topaz on the other hand still a rare item especially the pinkish, red, sherry and peach colors; these are orginally orange crystal containing Cr and after heating turns to a pink hue and show a Cr spectrum. Sources include Minais Gerais, Brazil and Mardan, Pakistan. Burma, Sri Lanka, China also produce topaz.

Treatable rough coming in large quantities by the hundred of kilos mostly from Sri Lanka, China, Nigeria and Brazil. Natural colors of red,pink and orange are exceeding rare.

Thermoluminescence may determine treated versus natural colors howver not enough gemological study has been reported on this subject.

Topaz is vey large sizes of over 20,000 carats have been cut and can be viewed in the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles and New York as well as the Smithsonian Nuseum in Washington DC. Sherry, champagne, light green and blue are desirable colors for any gem collection.

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Garnet

Garnets are found in various shades and occurs in many colors, except blue. But its dark red variety is valued as a precious stone although the mineral is quite common. Garnet crystals are 12 faced and has a vitreous luster, a white streak, and is normally transparent to translucent. Garnet has a hardness between 6.5 to 7.5 in the Mohs hardness scale.

The specific gravity varies between 3.56 and 4.32, depending upon the chemical composition. About garnet, there are many interesting mystic stories around the world and believe garnet as good stone for healing wealth and health, relieving skin conditions, protecting against poisons. Garnet may even protect one from thieves and if placed under the pillow, garnet would protect from having bad dreams. Many garnet crystals can be seen in a rock cavity. Cut brilliant garnets are used as ring stones with large ones as pendants, often with cabochon cut and carved.

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Our Top Jade Highlight Jade

Jade is no ordinary stone. Not even an ordinary "precious" stone. It has a "certain something" that made a Chinese emperor offer fifteen cities for a jade carving he could hold in one hand; that made Montezuma smile when he heard that Cortes was interested only in gold?? This is how begins one of the most beautiful books about Jade: "Jade, Stone of Heaven" by Richard Gump.

Jade name comes from the Spanish: "Piedra de Ijada", that then passed in French as ?Le jade?, but it was known for the Chinese as "Yu". For hundreds of years the word "jade" was used to describe a typically green gemstone of the alkaline pyroxene mineral group, however, in about 1863 gemologists were able to distinguish two types of the mineral, one which if often referred to as jadeite and the other as nephrite. Nephrite usually occurs as aggregates of amphibole crystals (silicate of magnesium) it is fibrous, hard to fracture and soapy in appearance. Jadeite is made up of interlocking microcrystalline pyroxene crystals (silicate of aluminium), it is more readily broken but more brilliant while polished. Even though this distinction has been made, the word "jade" is still used freely in the market to refer to both jadeite and nephrite. So Jade is not one gemstone but two!

In China and many other Asian countries, jade is believed to bring the wearer good luck and long life. It is also a symbol of high rank and authority. Jade can be found as gemstones, usually cut en cabochon, and as carvings for pendants, amulets, pipes, table utensils, and figurines. Many scenes from Chinese folklore are carved on jade discs and include symbols for fortune, fertility and longevity. More than 2000 years ago the Chinese used nephrite, due to its incredible tough structure, to carve weapons such as daggers and clubs. Jadeite is more recent, it was discovered by Chinese on the late between the XIII and the XVIII century and was fist named ?Yunnan jade? as it was coming from north Burma through Yunnan traders.

Jade is classified in the trade as Imperial Jade, Commercial Jade or Utility Jade.

The highest quality of jadeite is called ?Imperial Jade?. Seven sub categories of Imperial Jade including the ?kingfisher jade? or ?fei-ts?ui? combine high transparency with a rich saturated emerald-green color due to chromium. Imperial quality Jade is so rare and loved than top quality pieces can be more expensive than diamonds of equivalent weight?

"Commercial Jade" has the hue of green or violet, with stripes, specks or spots of other colors. It is translucent to near opaque. The violet variety owns its color to vanadium and or chromium and is famous as "Lavender jade".

For "Utility Jade" only the texture is determinant. Here no green or violet is visible. Utility Jade is usually used in carvings as statues or utensils. Fine, smooth, clear texture is the sign of top grade utility Jade. In carvings the value is placed heavily on the quality of the workmanship.

Natural color untreated Jade is known as "A-Jade" but Jade as all the highly valued gemstones have many imitations and is also sometimes treated:

Jade is commonly bleached and is then known as "B-Jade". The color of "B-Jade" does not usually last very long and "B-Jade" is more brittle as its structure is usually damaged by acids. Jade can also be impregnated with paraffin to improve its luster, or heated to

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