Show Me Your Learner Stones!!!!

[minousbijoux]

Greg: nice stones. But um cough, cough - Paraiba - cough, cough...

 

[minousbijoux]

I am just so impressed with the quality of all these learner stones as well as the speed with which you learned. Like I said, I lagged on both accounts.

 

[GregS]

Greg: nice stones. But um cough, cough - Paraiba - cough, cough...

Ok, just one.



And you're too modest MB. I'm sure you caught on quicker than most.

 

[minousbijoux]

Greg: nice stones. But um cough, cough - Paraiba - cough, cough...

Ok, just one.



And you're too modest MB. I'm sure you caught on quicker than most.

Everyone: Behold! True Paraibas! Someone besides LD actually owns beautiful glowing Paraibas!

ETA: thanks for the kind words.

 

[pregcurious]

I'm still a learner, so can I count all my stones as learner stones? I've been very slow and cautious to buy stones, and quite quick to return, so overall I am happy with my purchases. Here are my first purchases.

1) This moonstone choker was my first complete project (there is SMTB thread for this)
http://juliakaytaylor.blogspot.com/2011/12/custom-handmade-choker-for-lovely-blue.html
I am finding I don't wear it as a choker, and I am trying to find someone to alter it a longer length with thinner more simple chain like this:
http://www.riogrande.com/Product/Argentium-Silver-22mm-Flat-Drawn-Cable-Chain-By-the-Foot/626428B?Pos=7

I think I want it to be 18-20", but I am not sure.

The stones are from Barry. Here's a pic from Barry of one pair:


2) I also have a several welo opals from Barry and Ebay. I've posted this untouched pic before:


3) To jump to the chase, my first expensive stone was my red spinel, which you can see in my avatar's untouched pic. It was appraised as between R5/6 and slpR7/4. (Thank you, LD, for explaning the GIA grading system to me. It only took me 3 years to figure out what the appraiser meant!) It probably shows up as having an orange modifier on your screen; it has a purple modifier. Yes, it shifts slightly like all spinels, but you only see a slight orange modifier at night under crappy light.

 

[pregcurious]

Chrono, I would love to buy that small cuprian from you. I've always wanted to have a small one before buying a bigger one. I feel like owning one for a while helps me learn so I can be more comfortable with a bigger purchase.

 

[Snowyrin]

Glad that there's another PSer near me! I'm more than happy to share. Actually I purchased the stone online from a reputable PS listed vendor and got the ring hand forged by my BF friend's father who is a Hong Kong setter that lives in SG. But he only does some parts of the ring and he would have to pass to his friend to set in the diamonds, meaning I might have to pay twice in future. Then I started looking for a suitable and resonably priced setter in Far East Plaza, and am glad that I've found my current one whom I set most of my recent rings (including egg yolk) with.

Just to share, this is egg yolk's latest flower shot




Hand forged jewlery is not at all common in Singapore, therefore the huge price difference compared to mass produced jewellery. But for a style that suits your stone and personality I find it really worth it! FYI, they usually charge by the weight of the gold used, workmanship(depends on the complexity of the piece) and the diamonds they sourced for example a halo or sides if there's any.

Let me know if you are interested to know more, I'll disclose the exact location of the store.

Hope this helps in your search!

Your egg yolk looks good enough to eat! It's stunning! You're really good in taking photographs of your jewelry
Yes, I am interested to know where your setter is in Far East Plaza. I don't really need handforged rings, I just want to have more options when it comes to setting some of my stones.

Thanks for sharing!

Do pay Y S jewelry a visit located at lvl 2. Of cos there are several other more setters in the same building you can compare prices with. Good luck! What about sharing some of your stones here? I'm curious what you have on hand

 

[T L]

All of you had way nicer "learning stones" than me. There wasn't really an internet when I bought mine, although I could have used the education. Books were horrible resources too.

They're awful, your eyes have been warned.

[URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/hideous-learning-gems-your-eyes-have-been-warned.143876/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/hideous-learning-gems-your-eyes-have-been-warned.143876/[/URL]

 

[pregcurious]

TL, we had you and many other members of PS to teach us before we bought our learner stones. I lurked on PS for a long time before making my first post.

 

[Starzin]

TL you are a dear for baring your newbie soul. Let's face it, without the internet it's a wonder you found anything to buy, it must have taken a lot of dedicated leg work!

Do you still have them? There are some nice sized indicolites and reds there with promising flashes that might spruce up with a recut. Particularly 1st pic lower left and 2nd pic lower right How clean are they?

And I so agree with PC that so many people have benefited from the experience of you and others who are so willing to share. Thank you all soooo much

 

[T L]

TL you are a dear for baring your newbie soul. Let's face it, without the internet it's a wonder you found anything to buy, it must have taken a lot of dedicated leg work!

Do you still have them? There are some nice sized indicolites and reds there with promising flashes that might spruce up with a recut. Particularly 1st pic lower left and 2nd pic lower right How clean are they?

And I so agree with PC that so many people have benefited from the experience of you and others who are so willing to share. Thank you all soooo much

Thanks Preg and Starzin, I appreciate the kind words.

Yes, I still have them, but they're loose. I sold or reused the mountings. I never really look at them, or bother with them, as I think they're unattractive. Of course taste is speculative, but many of these gems were "black holes." Like other newbies in this hobby, I often confused dark tone with good saturation. I don't know what I was thinking, or the lighting at Intergem was really great (I got most of these from Intergem way back when).

 

[Jereni]

I love this thread

I'm absolutely still learning. I think I've gotten lucky with a couple more recent stones (but I probably overspent on them), and there's definitely a few missteps.

First stone was purchased in an attempt to create a ring similar to another PSers - Arujajane if I recall correctly. It's a pink tourmaline from Barry, and while of course it has fabulous cutting, in the end, the color is more of a dusty mauve, not very bright, and I hardly wear this anymore:


Not sure if I have the next two in the right order, but I bought this morganite ring on a whim at Intergem last winter. I loved it at the time, the design of the ring is great, but compared to the more vivid stones starting to fill up my jewelry box, I kinda regret the purchase. It's just not a very exciting color:


Then I wanted an aquamarine, and Peter T was lovely enough to cut some rough he had. Don't get me wrong - beautiful stone and flawless cutting. But it wasn't the real aquamarine color I wanted, so I ended up selling it recently:



What I've learned so far:
1. As they say in the pinned thread, it is all about color color color. I like vivid, and I really need to have the color spread very evenly throughout the stone.
2. Actually, cut is almost as important to me as color. I've occasionally passed on vivid stones I've seen on ebay or ajsgems, for example, because of off-center or wonky cuts, and I've held on to stones from precision cutters because I like the cut so much. But if I really wanted a particular kind of stone and color, color would still trump cut.
3. Clarity isn't really important to me. I find that I like the personality it brings, and sleepy stones have a fun look to them.
4. Extinction and dark areas in stones drive me NUTS.
5. I have a much lower size threshold than I would have guessed. If a stone starts getting above 8mm (in the shorter dimension), I find myself worrying that it will look like a ring pop and I'll knock it around. I am starting to navigate to smaller stones and then putting them in elaborate settings
6. I have an overwhelming penchant for minty greens and will probably end up with too many of them.
7. After PS introduced me to Mahenge spinels, pink in almost any other stone bores me to tears

 

[happybear]

Do pay Y S jewelry a visit located at lvl 2. Of cos there are several other more setters in the same building you can compare prices with. Good luck! What about sharing some of your stones here? I'm curious what you have on hand

Thanks, Snowyrin!

This has been a great thread! I'm rather embarrassed to share mine.

When I first started way back in 2011, I naively went to eBay and bought an ametrine and tourmaline. The ametrine was really cheap, and later I read somewhere that most ametrine in the market was either lab grown or treated, so it figures The tourmaline although the colour was nice, it had a window half the size of the stone!

I stopped buying from eBay after that and started getting from Bob Kast and Dan Stair instead, learning what precision cut is all about. I kept hearing about Barry too so I tried to get hold of his stones, but I'm always late for his drop due to the time difference so most of the time I ended up with not-so-gorgeous coloured stones from him but nicely cut nevertheless. I also purchased some from PSers like Minou and Freke. I ventured to Mastercutgems (Dana) and purchased a number of stones from him as well. By then I was comfortable enough to buy from eBay again and I mainly buy from one of Tan's stores or from Uli.

Here are some (poorly taken) photos:

My humble starter collection. My budget was really low so you can see the colours are not very vivid.

Here are some decent ones:

Chrysoberyl cushion from Tan. There's no brown in it unlike the photo, just yellow and green. The mount was from an LOGR auction.


This garnet from Dan is too dark but it gives flashes of red all the time. So despite it's darkness, I still like it and wear this once in a while. The mount is also from LOGR


The round pink tourmaline was purchased from Freke while the 2 smaller cushions are from Minou.

When I got pregnant in 2012 I stopped buying gemstones. I just lost interest somehow, and I attributed that to my baby. After my baby turned 1, I came back to PS.

Here's what I learnt:
1. I still have a lot to learn how to discern saturation and tone.
2. I can't take peach colour. It just appears washed out against my skin tone
3. I don't mind inclusions, as long as it doesn't pose any structural issues and has great colour
4. Window bugs me, although I don't have to have precision cut
5. I don't mind grey, but not in pastel coloured stone
6. I am beginning to like plump marquis and pears, although finding one that doesn't black out at the tips is a challenge
7. I prefer square cushion to elongated ones
8. I don't like brown modifiers in red, yellow or orange stones
9. The minimum size of a stone to me is about 6mm. Any smaller, it will be hard to notice

That's all I can think of for now.

 

[evergreen]

Another still-learning... I'm all over the map, mostly buying stuff from LT but branched out into eBay yesterday (no, really, I don't even know if I made a terrible decision or not. ) I moved over to CS from diamonds about a year ago and am absorbing as much information from you helpful ladies and gentlemen as fast as I can!

I just sold my first CS purchase, a Peter Torracca sapphire that turned out to have not quite the tone and saturation I was looking for. What made it easier? Spinels. Glorious spinels. I bought one, and then in quick succession, two more, on Loupe Troop... the first one was the native cut pink-orange cushion on the far right.



Once I manage to save for settings, I'd like to put the orange-pink cushion into something custom, sterling silver with a YG bezel and maybe off-white diamond sidestones (or tsavorite or spess or even amethyst!). The round is darker but precision-cut and with a gorgeous color in hand... since it's the size of a 1ct diamond, more or less, it would fit perfectly into http://www.ebay.com/itm/271383946269?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2661&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT . Not sure what to do with the pear, if anything; in person, it has too much brown for my taste, and maybe a little too windowed.

I've ended up with a bunch of smallish ovals, two from LT: a (probably copper-bearing) tourmaline and a rubellite, which are about the same size as my impulse-buy oregon sunstone and a freebie gray-green tourmaline from Dana at Mastercut Gems...



...which came with my Christmas present, a glorious bright-green (and clear, fascinatingly!) narrow emerald-cut tourmaline. This will definitely be a ring, and definitely with emerald-cut diamond sidestones, and definitely custom trellis setting. I know exactly what I want to do with it. I just have to wait til my stone fund hits $2500 or so... and we're FAR away from that.



And then, a lovely aquamarine from Litnon, which was cheaper because of its inclusions -- makes me think I should buy more included stones, because golly, I don't notice it in person at all. The cutting gives it beautiful sparkle, and compared with my other stones, it's huge! HUGE! The plan is for a DanielM ring which I'm sure you've all seen -- https://www.etsy.com/listing/106630954/split-shank-trellis-ring?ref=shop_home_feat_1 -- with synthetic alexandrite sidestones, since my husband's birthstone is aquamarine and mine is alex. (And aside from his general awesomeness as a human being, I have him to thank for helping me find Pricescope by letting me design my own engagement ring!)

But right now I'm so excited about buying stuff I have no idea how I'll really rein it in and actually set anything. Isn't the thrill of the chase greater with unset stones? Here's how I'm rationalizing it: I'm too new to know what I REALLY love. So, I should expect to buy and sell a bunch of stones between now and when I invest in, like, that $2500 setting for the Dana tourmaline. If I still love it by the time I've saved enough to set it, it shouldn't matter that the stone was an eighth the price of the setting to finally put it on my hand, right?

Two more eBay stones (the funds from selling that PT sapphire burning a hole in my pocket) I haven't seen yet: a pink-orange Dan Stair sunstone (low-risk indeed!) which I think will satisfy my need for schiller and pink-orange all at once...



...and a high-risk random (inexpensive?) chrysoberyl that I'm hoping is green>yellow. Despite seller's manipulative use of what appears to be a white LED penlight to give it a blue-green glow, I've seen gorgeous chrysos on here, but never seen one in person. Keep your fingers crossed for me.



I'm still learning, but for now, perfectly happy to stare at my preciousssssss as my collection gradually grows. How else can I learn what is worth it? Short of Chrono becoming my personal gem shopper -- and who can afford that? -- all my mistakes turn into lessons and my job for now is just to keep them from being too pricey.

 

[FrekeChild]

I'm really proud of everyone! I can see how so many people who have started buying in the last couple years have really put the effort into reading and learning - SO MANY of your "learner" stones are so much better than mine!

And we're here to help everyone learn! So don't hesitate to ask for help! We have a really great, helpful group of people who spend a lot of time around here looking for stones and spending their time answering questions!

 

[LoversKites]

I'm really proud of everyone! I can see how so many people who have started buying in the last couple years have really put the effort into reading and learning - SO MANY of your "learner" stones are so much better than mine!

And we're here to help everyone learn! So don't hesitate to ask for help! We have a really great, helpful group of people who spend a lot of time around here looking for stones and spending their time answering questions!

Aw Freke you're so sweet! I haven't had the chance to say this yet but I'm very grateful that such a helpful and kind community like PS exists and that everyone is so eager to teach and learn together.

Admittedly, I'm a bit scared of venturing out of the CS section, though

 

[evergreen]

I'm really proud of everyone! I can see how so many people who have started buying in the last couple years have really put the effort into reading and learning - SO MANY of your "learner" stones are so much better than mine!

And we're here to help everyone learn! So don't hesitate to ask for help! We have a really great, helpful group of people who spend a lot of time around here looking for stones and spending their time answering questions!

Aw Freke you're so sweet! I haven't had the chance to say this yet but I'm very grateful that such a helpful and kind community like PS exists and that everyone is so eager to teach and learn together.

Admittedly, I'm a bit scared of venturing out of the CS section, though

Have to echo LoversKites -- the experienced posters around here probably have only a shadow of an inkling of how much their knowledge has helped those of us just starting out. Both feeling comfortable buying stones (or saying no), and knowing what to look for. We owe you guys a huge debt of gratitude for your time & effort posting thoughtful, informative answers to our questions... and probably a $$$ debt as well, for knowing what to spend our pennies on. Oh, TL, bless your heart for sharing those early stones, you can see how PS has sped the newbies' collections right through that stage you had to go through on your own!

So... Thanks, y'all. We appreciate you.

 

[LeaD]

I used to believe it easier to buy a "nice stone" already set, I also always went for the cheap stuff and mostly bought those while travelling. I can safely say that I like NONE of what I bought then - that was more than 10 years ago. Sometimes I pick them up from the bottom of my jewellery box, sigh at them wondering why I bothered moving those more than 10.000 km (almost 7,000 miles) and try to wear them while at the beach or in places where I want to look very low key not to risk anything. Even then I usually prefer wearing pure silver jewellery with nice design than those ugly rocks.
While preparing for my next gem investigation trip, I decided to try out my different cameras to identify the best ones for catching details and thus being able to ask for advice from PSers later. I used those bottom-of-the-jewellery box stones for the tests.


A pair of topaze earrings: very greenish, very dull, totally ugly
another pair of topaze earrings set on gold and not that cheap (bought at a standard jeweller) - I'm still not so sure about their problem, except that one is brighter than the other and overall their color is way too light, like washed out
a pair of garnet earrings - one is brown, the other redder, both are dull, black-holes, totally awful
then a garnet-like necklace, which I always suspected was colored glass and not real gems - I paid the price for glass though - not as awful as the rest to my eyes
a magic topaze pendant bought in Brasil in the mining city for not too expensive but neither that cheap, which I never understood why I did not like until I picked it up again a few days ago - uhm the dull greyish color, combined with a magic never-ending and always expanding window, suddenly became more than obvious reasons
a garnet pendant, darker, duller and uglier than the earrings, with a back almost full with just a slight off-center small hole, which probably contribute to preventing the light from going through and showing the full horror of the stone
a very small sapphire pendant with a very very green blue sapphire. Green blue could be turquoise or reminding of south seas. In this case, no, it just reminds me of a grassy unclean pond water.


one of many views of the magic window

 

[endless_summer]

All of you had way nicer "learning stones" than me. There wasn't really an internet when I bought mine, although I could have used the education. Books were horrible resources too.

They're awful, your eyes have been warned.

[URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/hideous-learning-gems-your-eyes-have-been-warned.143876/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/hideous-learning-gems-your-eyes-have-been-warned.143876/[/URL]

I love that thread! This one too, but the your eyes have been warned thread takes it to a new level of learning curve

 

[minousbijoux]

I'm really proud of everyone! I can see how so many people who have started buying in the last couple years have really put the effort into reading and learning - SO MANY of your "learner" stones are so much better than mine!

And we're here to help everyone learn! So don't hesitate to ask for help! We have a really great, helpful group of people who spend a lot of time around here looking for stones and spending their time answering questions!

I could not agree with Freke more.

 

[happybear]

Have to echo LoversKites -- the experienced posters around here probably have only a shadow of an inkling of how much their knowledge has helped those of us just starting out. Both feeling comfortable buying stones (or saying no), and knowing what to look for. We owe you guys a huge debt of gratitude for your time & effort posting thoughtful, informative answers to our questions... and probably a $$$ debt as well, for knowing what to spend our pennies on. Oh, TL, bless your heart for sharing those early stones, you can see how PS has sped the newbies' collections right through that stage you had to go through on your own!

So... Thanks, y'all. We appreciate you.

+1
Couldn't have said it better.

 

[RSargent]

This one had me from hello. It's a 5.2 carat Tanzanian pink spinel. It is HOT HOT HOT pink. Crazy pink like it isn't real. But it is.
I had it tested. It's huge so I have to figure out how to set it. Any ideas? It was very inexpensive ($5). I think the person was reading the carat size and not the price on the gem jar. It was years ago and I didn't know any better. Then again wasn't spinel very cheap years ago? Anyhow. Lucky me.

 

[chrono]

$5 for a 5 carat spinel, even purchased years ago, sends sirens and red alarms off everywhere for me. I would have it checked out by a good lab to find out if it is one of the well made flame fusion synthetic spinel. They are notoriously difficult to ID using standard tools because their characteristics are identical to natural spinels.

 

[RSargent]

The store was very anti-created and synthetic stones, but sounds like a good idea! My investment was so small I just haven't done it yet.

 

[RSargent]

Here's a large hiddenite I've had for while. If anyone has any setting ideas I would love it!
It's almost 3 carats and more greenish than yellow.

 

[minousbijoux]

So I came across the first stones I ever bought and wanted to share them. When I was a kid, I would make simple silver jewelry. I would save up babysitting money and go downtown to the old jewelry district buildings with cubbyhole businesses on every floor that you had to be buzzed into to conduct business. I would buy bits of silver and "semi-precious" stones. I coveted those stones. Anyway, I recently stumbled upon three and thought I should share them. They are nothing special - incredibly included and not suitable to be set, but they were sure special to me back then!

Anyway, here they are all cabochons - an amethyst, an amber, and a turquoise. You can see the surface reaching inclusions in the amethyst. In fact, I'm also including one pic of what happened when as usual, I was not as careful in handling the stones as I should've been.

 

[RSargent]

I love this. Like many of us your love for gems was forged early on. And you still have them! My first gemstone can be seen in this thread behind my hiddenite. It's a bicolored tourmaline my dad bought me when I was 9 years old. He died when he was my age....only 52. He was an amazing man and father. I miss him.

 

[mochiko42]

Slightly OT, but where do you buy your gem display boxes?

 

[davi_el_mejor]

These learner enough

There are 4 stones out of the lot that I would buy again. The giant cushion center back, is a kunzite that is absolutely amazing. There is a sphalerite in there that is awesome for it's collectability. The boulder opal on the upper right. There is also a pink tourmaline in there that needs a recut but it's a sweet sweet pink.

I'd also probably keep the smokey quartz that dominate the third row, they're not anything special but they are pretty cool.

 

[mochiko42]

These learner enough

There are 4 stones out of the lot that I would buy again. The giant cushion center back, is a kunzite that is absolutely amazing. There is a sphalerite in there that is awesome for it's collectability. The boulder opal on the upper right. There is also a pink tourmaline in there that needs a recut but it's a sweet sweet pink.

I'd also probably keep the smokey quartz that dominate the third row, they're not anything special but they are pretty cool.

WOW. That is a huge collection.

How big is that kunzite? It looks humongous compared to the other stones in the photo!