Heads Up on Blue Afghani Tourm

[minousbijoux]

Our friend who is currently in Afghanistan mentioned that he has some very large blue Afghani tourms that he will recut. He cut me a beautiful one a few months ago that is just perfect, so I'm not in the market for any more, plus it looks like these will cut around 8 - 10 carat stones - great for cocktail rings, but probably too blingy for me. But anyway, its a great opportunity to benefit from his trip and come away with a gorgeous stone. Not too often you see good quality Afghani stones in that size range.

 

[ooo~Shiney!]

Hey MB, any pictures of yours floating around?
I wouldn't like anything that large myself, but just checking on the color
(and as we know, it's all about the color )

 

[rosetta]

Would love one.

Who is this friend?

 

[minousbijoux]

Jim Rentfrow cut mine, which follows. If you email him, he can certainly provide you photos of the stones he has. I love the color of the second one - the one more simply cut with an eye visible inclusion (which obviously would be cut away).

 

[Arkteia]

Oh, that is a beauty! And Jim being such a great cutter, the stone should look stunning. I have several stones to set and also plan to save some $$ for an expensive project so I am not in the loop for the time being but someone ought to be lucky!

 

[minousbijoux]

I should be clear that the stone in the photo is one I have had from Jim for several months now and I don't believe is from the same rough as what he has now - though I guess its theoretically possible. Its just that he knows I have a thing for blue tourmaline and he contacted me the minute he found some over there. I have seen photos of both stones, which have already been simply cut by I assume Afghani lapidaries. Jim plans on doing recuts. The color is slightly different on each and is just exquisite (IMO) on one of them.