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Jade Bangle

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chrono

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Despite reading up on jade, I still have no idea now to pick decent quality pieces. Ones that I think are good pieces are ridiculously expensive while others are cheap and they are all from the same place so obviously the pricing must be consistant. These are Type A jade.

Without giving the game away, which would you pick and why.
yg57.jpg
cj227.jpg


cj197.jpg
cj261.jpg


cj211.jpg
TI-C5S.jpg


How do I choose? There are all close in price range.
 

Kismet

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I don''t know anything about jade but my favorite are bottom left, top right, bottom right.

I find the other three too pale to be visually appealing. I like bottom left because of the sharp contrast, top and bottom rights for the greens.
 

widget

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I wish I knew more about jade...maybe this thread will help! I wonder if it would get more attention from the gemstone experts if it were moved to the Colored Gemstone Forum....

Anyway...what I have heard is that one should look for "jadeite"...not nephrite...and that ideally the jade should not be color enhanced...

I guess I like the first one best (top right)...but I''m not sure why! The extra green one on the bottom is beautiful, but looks "fakey" to me compared to the others. If it''s priced the same as the others, I''d assume it''s color treated, or even worse...nephrite.

Heck...I don''t know! Looking forward to hearing what others think.

widget
 

chrono

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Okay, I'll help out with some hints: The fakey looking one on the bottom right is in the same price range as the rest because it is an estate piece (used). The previous owner had it for 20 years and bought it from a Vietnamese store.

I am so undecided. I like ALL of them!

ETA. All these are Jadeite, not nephrite.
 

valeria101

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Date: 4/6/2006 12:20:53 PM
Author: Chrono

The fakey looking one on the bottom right is in the same price range as the rest because it is an estate piece (used).




That is a new concept - that the 'estate' status brings a discount. These ain't diamonds
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It looks like an attempt to color treatment gone wrong.


I am quite naive about jade treatments: bleaching, resin impregnation and dyeing sound OK, but there's a never ending range of chemical treatments meant to color, bleach or age pieces. It wouldn't be inconceivable that a couple of different processes are used to doctor a single piece. However, I doubt these guys went that far - 'antique jade' is what gets the all out treatment!

Taking what is said on the sellers' website for granted, it looks like they process a local source of white jade, and sell the usual inexpensive treated jade (label "Burmese Jade') and some serpentine (label 'water jade' - which is a common name anyway, not necessarily misleading). Btw. the local source has to be something else than jadeite, since there's none in China last time I've checked! (list of jadeite deposits here).

The prices seem in line with these descriptions, so... nothing wrong there.

The bangles may be treated or not - this doesn't mean much quality-wise. There's untreated jade for any imaginable use from table tops and wall tiles to some of the most expensive precious stones. As someone else's tag line puts it "I've never met a stone I didn't like!" - no joke
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I would likely go for a bangle with round not D-section, and natural looking colors preferred (say, second row left).
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PS. I wish I knew more about jade treatments and prices... but I have no idea how to go about insuring ID & quality for such purchases online
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The only thing that does feel wrong about online jade sales, is the outrageous amount of fakes, look-alikes and amazing range of treatments that go around: taking the average web listing, one may come to the conclusion that Burma is nothing but a mountain of honey-like translucent jadeite, much of it in beautiful green, violet and yellow shades... Now, wouldn't that be sweet! Too bad the real stuff is no more common than the gem quality rough of most other gems. Unlike other gems though, there are 'mountains' (OK, really BIG boulders!) of jadeite out there only not of gem quality - think tiles and table tops. As much cannot be said about non-gem quality ruby... or dunno, anything else really. Interestingly, that common jadeite does not look like the average online jade sample at all. Interesting?


Anyway, I don't have a collection of jade references online
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There are a couple of fascinating pages on www.ruby-sapphire.com

And I hope the little forum at Chicochai is still working - debating jade treatments of all things.
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valeria101

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[added after three Google clicks]
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First of all, I have to say I am starting to like the shop!

Second, did you have nay idea what 'soft jade' means? Well, at least until 10 minutes ago I didn't.

Heres' the short of it.
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Ahhh... these commercial names!


#1 the shop says that 'Xiuyan jade is not as hard as Burmese jadeite'... etc. Cool, but what's up with 'softer jade'? Gotta' ask Google.

#2 So... The net produced a quick overview of what Xiuyan Jade is! - famous source, a few mines including two of 'soft jade'. So, what is it???

#3. Serpentine .


Please take with a grain of salt, and consider the obviously appealing looks of the thing before taking any decision.

My little 5 minute search could be wrong, and everything else. I don't have the goods here to look at or anything. You know.... And I would wear a white serpentine bangle for the money. Dont't have such a thing, but I like the looks of this stone and have other bits around the house - it makes beautiful, almost paper-thin translucent carvings and the light greens and yellowish greens are pleasantly airy. Now knowing what the bangles are, would expect some eggshell-green shades from them. The ones with mottled bright green may be died - I am used with cloud like, discrete color patterns in serpentine, not textured vivid spots like the moss-in-snow jadeite. Serpentine soaks in color very well - being quite soft and porous (problem with accidental staining, but not too bad). I can't say I have seen any died to resemble jade because the looks is quite telling - it has a waxy appearance like nothing else.

There seems to be a good load of reports about Xiuyan jade sources - no wonder if the region is such important traditional source of nephrite jade!



-------------------
link to source

"Xiuyan jade mine
The Xiuyan bright-coloured fine-grained jade is famous world-wide because of its favourable hardness and processing properties. The Xiuyan jade deposit is located app. 100 km southeast of Dashiqiao city with the reserves of 176x104 tonnes of jade. The biggest jade body reaches 6x104 tonnes (figure below). The jade is variegated coloured – green, dark green, light green, yellow green, bluish green, greenish white and white having fibrous to lepidoblastic texture and massive structure. The ore types are mainly of serpentinite nephrite, tremolite nephrite and chlorite nephrite.




Fig4.jpg


The giant jade body (6x104 t) in Xiuyan jade mine.



On a quick read, it looks like the region produces nephrite, serpentine and bowenite all intensely used to produce ornamental objects from the inexpensive to the rarefied, and the source of 'soft jade' mentioned by the shop could be any! although the 'soft' attribute corresponds more likely to serpentine. Bowenite? maybe not - less common apparently and of tell-tale greasy, even texture. A bangle of that would be quite a pain to keep in good shape (soft).


[STOP! ... right... I am sure the entire map of jade mining is somewhere online these days! ]


 

zhuzhu

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I know jade pretty well. The bangles you showed are very unlikely to be grade A. They have been treated by color (grade B) and acid for enhanced clarity (grade C). There are a ocean of "fake grade A" jade in US market from Hong Kong. I would be very careful in believing what online vendors claim. One online vendor I like and trust is this http://www.lumingta.com/bracelet-jade-bracelet-c-30_37.html

Take a careful look at grade A Jade vs. non-grade-A jade. You will notice the difference in texture and shine, as well as the differential grain surface of the two types.
 

sunkist

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My favorite is the top right
 

movie zombie

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please see my response over in the color forum.

movie zombie
 
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