Garnet hunt - which of these two?

[junebug17]

Ah ok, gotcha, sorry about that! This choice is harder for me lol, they are both lovely - I’m leaning towards the mahenge, I’m thinking it won’t darken up as much in low light situations - I think it boils down to which one speaks to you the most. Which one do you like better?

 

[sapphiredream]

Ah ok, gotcha, sorry about that! This choice is harder for me lol, they are both lovely - I’m leaning towards the mahenge, I’m thinking it won’t darken up as much in low light situations - I think it boils down to which one speaks to you the most. Which one do you like better?

I like the actual color of the Umbelite better.
That berry color in outdoor, bright light is amazing.

That being said - if this Umbalite darkens up more in low light than the Mahenge would, I would prefer the Mahenge.

I haven't received enough visual information about the Mahenge next to the Umbelite on hand, low light yet...so I don't know.
I can only go by accounts I read here and elsewhere on the web which appear to suggest that Mahenges do not darken as much.

After all, I think this is another major reason why Garnets are less sought-after than rubies, rubellites, spinels and other reddish stones. Most get too dark normally and they don't hold color as well in low light conditions.

The Mahenge seems to deviate a bit from this garnet norm - hence the higher price. I THINK.

Still waiting to hear from them with some extra details in terms of comparisons of these two stones.

 

[chroman]

I just keep wondering why the significant difference in price between the Mahenge and the Umbalite?

All sorts of reasons that don't have to do with the color behavior (like rough costs, cutting yields, and so on)!

The color shift I was mentioning happens with differen *types* of light - incandascent, fluresent, led, daylight, etc. It's not tied to the intensity of the light - dim vs bright.

The video you posted supports my worry about the darkness of the stone. If you're having reservations about darkness, this might not be the best stone.

 

[Cockatiel]

The color shift I was mentioning happens with differen *types* of light - incandascent, fluresent, led, daylight, etc. It's not tied to the intensity of the light - dim vs bright.

Exactly. You can flood the stone with thousands of intense fluorescent bulbs and the stone will likely show a lot of brown. Doesn't matter how bright the light is. But that's red garnet for you....no way to avoid that, generally speaking.

 

[sapphiredream]

Exactly. You can flood the stone with thousands of intense fluorescent bulbs and the stone will likely show a lot of brown. Doesn't matter how bright the light is. But that's red garnet for you....no way to avoid that, generally speaking.

Do you think the Mahenge would be better - or do you also file Mahenge under the larger "Red Garnet" category?

Because yes...in the end, no deep Garnet will face up like a crystal light/diamond-ish stone.
It's a colored stone, after all.

 

[Cockatiel]

Sorry for the confusion, I meant any red family garnets when I said red garnet. Mahenge vs non-Mahenge I personally didn't find a critical difference in terms of color shift but others might disagree. If anything some Mahenge garnets can turn downright tan brown, so it depends on the individual stone. So I wouldn't just pay the premium for it expecting it will hold color much better just because of that Mahenge designation....it's still a garnet and behaves the same....

 

[sapphiredream]

Sorry for the confusion, I meant any red family garnets when I said red garnet. Mahenge vs non-Mahenge I personally didn't find a critical difference in terms of color shift but others might disagree. If anything some Mahenge garnets can turn downright tan brown, so it depends on the individual stone. So I wouldn't just pay the premium for it expecting it will hold color much better just because of that Mahenge designation....it's still a garnet and behaves the same....

Ok, good. That's kind of what I was hoping to hear.
Thank you - this is MUCH appreciated.
I will take the plunge with the Umbalite. At least, when this one darkens (which is inevitable, I know iti will), at least it will look like dark plum/purple - not brown.

Off I go to pay.

 

[Cockatiel]

Good luck!
I know how frustrating it is looking for a gem that will fit in a setting. That's very tough to do. Hopefully the stone fits in your setting nicely and you love it when you recieve it. Even if you don't absolutely love it, I know how extremely annoying that is, but it's not the end of the world, you just send it back and chalk it up to "education".

 

[sapphiredream]

Good luck!
I know how frustrating it is looking for a gem that will fit in a setting. That's very tough to do. Hopefully the stone fits in your setting nicely and you love it when you recieve it. Even if you don't absolutely love it, I know how extremely annoying that is, but it's not the end of the world, you just send it back and chalk it up to "education".

Mmmm...well...I really hope I won't have to send it back.

The vendor was in fact a bit reluctant to sell me a stone under conditions where it would have to fit precisely in my setting, because he was almost sure I would send it back. And from Thailand...yeah.
Once I decided I would tweak the setting to fit around the stone, we revisited.

I also don't want to spend too much on re-doing this statement ring because I need to save for my holy Grail sapphire ring. I postponed an actual e-ring ever since we got married 16 years ago. Never really had one - it was the statement ring above that took its place.

 

[junebug17]

Looking forward to seeing it! Hope you love it!

 

[MissyBeaucoup]

I love that plummy color! I think it will look dramatic on you. Garnets are so pretty!

 

[sapphiredream]

I love that plummy color! I think it will look dramatic on you. Garnets are so pretty!

I hope so too.

I keep telling myself it can't look worse than with the beryl, which caused me to often this substitute e-ring/statement ring quite often.
I called it "substitute" because it never had a nicer, more expensive precious stone in it so my husband and I had decided to do something nice once day .
That day has come and it will be a sapphire ring - but obviously, not this size.

But I wanted to keep my hefty, statement e-ring too. I paid around 100$ for that large beryl over 10 years ago...and neither the cut nor the color were particularly helpful.

Plum/burgundy/deep berry are the colors I wear most often - so I am cautiously optimistic.

And hey...if it darkens...it will match my eyes.
For a Caucasian, at least, I don't think they can get any darker or more opaque.

 

[jewelsforalltosee]

@sapphiredream I know you've already purchased the umbalite, but i thought I'd say that I can't see much difference between it and the Mahenge, so I would have gone with the umbalite just like you did, given the price difference. Can't wait to see it!
I did take some photos of my prasiolite ring, I need to start a thread perhaps? And upon further inspection, it's even larger than I remembered - 8cts, not 7...

 

[sapphiredream]

Jewelsforall,

I'd love to see your large ring!

And thank you for the support on the umbalite.
If it looked IRL like in the outdoor video they gave me, I'd be beyond thrilled because I'm nut about that berry color.m
Butni know it will look more like the indoor video - low light and set. I Just hope that berry will still be visible somehow.

It's going to be a long wait - 2-4 weeks from Thailand.

 

[jewelsforalltosee]

ack, that's a long wait then in the meantime, here's my ring:
7.95ct prasiolite, 10k setting. Decided not to start a thread yet, won't be resetting it in the near future. But I think it would make a better pendant, perhaps.

 

[sapphiredream]

Jewels - I think it's beautiful the way it is! I love the ring's basket!
Considering how large the stone is and the fact that it is not deeply/darkly colored - I think this setting is right. By the time you add thicker band/more gold or extra diamond helpers - it might just look too much. Is that a concave cut?

With deeply colored stones though - it's a different game, especially when they are so large.
I found they look best surrounded by some white halo or at least some kind of diamond help, like side baguettes, etc.

I am a bit nervous about how my Umbelite will look all on its own, without a halo - in my existing setting. I just hope the side baguettes will be helpful enough. If not I might have to melt the setting and redo (which is what my jeweler would actually want, no surprise here).

But I think yours is perfect like that - due to its color.
Never mind you have VERY beautiful hands (virtually perfect) - and you can pull off any kind of stone in any kind of ring. I am jelly bean.
One can dream of some day being able to get "the most beautiful stone ever", but not the most beautiful hands ever.

The look I don't really like with large, deeply colored stone is something like this:



To me, this stone is begging for some kind of diamond help around.

Look how things get better with dark stones when surrounded by diamonds:



This garnet color above is a pretty common brown-red (not even that nice) - but the ring still looks fine with those pretty diamonds sparkling away and doing all the work.

 

[jewelsforalltosee]

well thank you for the hand compliment very nice of you to say!! Yes, it is a concave cut, very interesting look I think. Well hmmm...your comments regarding the size working because of the color, make sense. I definitely like the halo around the darker stone. Brings it to life. Maybe I'll have to take my ring out on date night and see how I feel about it. I literally haven't worn it in years. In the end I just want to wear it and appreciate it!

I think your umbalite will look great in that setting, it isn't a halo setting but it will have those big nice diamonds flanking it. I can't wait to hear what you think of the stone in person!

 

[sapphiredream]

Well...after quite a few weeks my Umbelite from Jeff Davies (actually Daniel Davies, Jeff's son!) arrived from Thailand.
It is a BEAUTIFUL, sparkly, very well cut stone. I love it!
In certain lights, the flashes of deep raspberry/blackberry pink are absolutely amazing.
In other lights, it looks almost like a fine ruby.
Yet in lower lights the stone DOES shift/darken and appears like a very deep burgundy red.
However this doesn't bother me because I DID want a deeper color and not something like a bright pink tourmaline that could clash with too many clothing items I wear.
Besides, I think that those who expect bright red/pink from a garnet can't quite appreciate garnet's deeper, more sober beauty.

So I am happy!

It is indeed very difficult to photprograph the stone just right and capture photos that do it justice.

I took the stone to my jeweler today to talk about setting it in my ring (originally with a beryl as center stone).
He is a rather exacting jeweler from New York - and he was quite impressed with the stone.
He said "really beautiful, so lively, you did quite well!".

So here are some extremely non-professional pictures - the best I could do with my cell phone camera.
The pictures absolutely cannot do justice to this very sparkly stone with a beautiful color. It is much nicer in realty than anything I am able to show here:

 

[sapphiredream]

I wish I could take those high resolution, close-up pictures but I don't know how.
My cell phone can only focus so much and the pics kind of come out blurry.

In the first 2 pics, the stone is also covered by the plastic cover of the little box, otherwise I could not hold the stone well in the right light.

I will try to take better pictures tomorrow - but it seems to me that well-cut garnets really do seem to be stones that look much better in reality than in pictures.

 

[pwsg07]

I wish I could take those high resolution, close-up pictures but I don't know how.
My cell phone can only focus so much and the pics kind of come out blurry.

In the first 2 pics, the stone is also covered by the plastic cover of the little box, otherwise I could not hold the stone well in the right light.

I will try to take better pictures tomorrow - but it seems to me that well-cut garnets really do seem to be stones that look much better in reality than in pictures.

I used a marco len for the phone and the zoom function of the phone together to take a close up photo. I usually take the photos with the stone facing the light source indoor. I hope others share their photo taking skill.

 

[jewelsforalltosee]

Lovely!! I hear you on how hard it is to photograph garnets (and any darker stone, IMO). I love the beautiful pink in the 4th photo!

 

[sapphiredream]

I used a marco len for the phone and the zoom function of the phone together to take a close up photo. I usually take the photos with the stone facing the light source indoor. I hope others share their photo taking skill.

My husband has received one of those for Christmas but said it did not work very well - I don't think he even knew what to do with it.

I will have to look at it closer to see if I can use it on my phone.

 

[junebug17]

Oh wow it’s beautiful sapphiredream! Such a rich and luxurious color.

 

[Stone Hunter]

Your new Garnet looks LOVELY! I hope it will fit nicely in the setting you have. I can't wait to see your photos of the completed project.

Garnets do seem almost impossible to get an accurate photograph of.

 

[dkata]

@sapphiredream your new garnet just looks like mine. Mine came from JD also.
Your umbalite looks like the same color, and I really know, how hard it is to photograph it.

I hope this stone is going to fit in your setting well!

 

[sapphiredream]

Hello,

A few months after I finally got my garnet...I now finally have my ring.
I went back and forth with the jeweler over two options - 1) replacing the stone only in my original beryl ring and 2) redoing the entire ring.
I wish he had communicated the cost of #2 earlier in the process to save me some time - but in the end, I opted for #1.
The garnet comes from Jeff Davies (actually, his son).
I think it is a major improvement over the original beryl which was too flat (minimal sparkle, mediocre cut), too square in combination with the straight, non-tapered shank but especially...too yellow,, to the point where it clashed with everything I wore.

I love the rhodolite garnet and that deep raspberry color; I also found that the more oval shape of the stone and slightly smaller size - soften up the look of the ring and make it kook more feminine.

I just wanted to post an update after a half-a-year process and to thank you all for all the help I received here.

Original ring:

 

[sapphiredream]

PS: The garnet does look much more colorful and sparkly in reality. The photos darken it up and are nowhere closer to doing it justice.
But I found garnets are indeed very hard to photograph - it is difficult to showcase their true beauty in pictures.

PS2: Also, excuse my less-than-manicured nails, I had just done a bit of gardening.

 

[Garnetgirl]

What a beautiful transformation of your ring! The colour is lovely, luscious, and really pops against your skin tone. So much more presence than the yellow beryl.
The rounded shape of your rhodolite goes so well with the side diamonds. As a garnet lover myself, your ring is now one of my favourites on PS.

 

[737liz]

What a yummy color! And such a striking side profile; it looks like architectural perfection! I'm glad you found your perfect stone.

 

[sapphiredream]

Thank you, garnetgirl and 737lizakg! I am glad to see other people find the outcome so desirable .
I feel this is clearly an improvement from a ring I just could not wear because of its color - so now I expect to get some wear out of it, after so many years.

The only reason why this is still not my IDEAL ring is the shank.
Today I would have done it a bit differently - with tapered baguettes for a more feminine, graceful look, instead of the rectangular baguettes the original jeweler used over a decade ago and which resulted in a belt-like, "strong" look.
At that time, I didn't know how to explain the design I had in mind very well.

Unfortunately, the cost of redoing the ring altogether now, with new tapered baguettes, was more than I wanted to pay. But I do find that the more oval shape of the garnet softens up the straight shank somewhat.

As for the garnet stone - I opted for a rhodolite strictly for its color.
That deep raspberry color is really amazing in good light and it goes with everything I wear. The Jeff Davies cut is also excellent because the stone sparkles like crazy in the right light.

I've had some people ask me whether it was a ruby or a pink tourmaline.
Nobody so far guessed "garnet".