Help choosing a green gemstone

[Clairitek]

In case you read my other thread on selecting gemstone rough my father and I have realized we can''t really afford the fabulous Jeff White this time around so I have moved on to the daunting task of trying to find a pre-cut stone.

We are considering cushion cut and round.

Ideally the stone would be 7-7.5 mm. It will be going in a yellow gold bezel setting.

Here are some stones I am considering. Please comment if you''re so inclined.

Round 1.41 ct VVS Peridot

I am quite taken by this green sapphire too... Its not round or cushion but I think its pretty. Would yellow gold be too much for this?
Green Sapphire

Yummy mint tourmaline... smaller than I originally set out to find

Thats all I could find for now after sifting through around 15 or so websites. As you can see I am probably in need of some help...

If you''re interested in the setting we are considering is this Caleb Meyer. I am hoping it can be modified to fit whatever stone we end up with.

 

[T L]

Peridot is really too soft for rings.

Green sapphire is not the prettiest of green stones typically IMO.

Afghani mint tourmaline is gorgeous, and I would highly recommend it out of the three types of stones you chose. It''s probably the most valuable as well, especially in fine mint green tones. Did you check out precisiongem as well, I think he has some Afghani mint green tourmalines that are affordable.

Good luck on your pursuit of the perfect green gem!

 

[Clairitek]

Thanks so much for the input tourmaline_lover! I just found your posts on the ebay vendors thread and now I am also quite taken with this bright orange

My friend has a yellow gold and peridot ring and I started out with peridot in mind for this ring because I loved the color combination but then I saw the mint garnet on Jeff White''s website and was just speechless. I appreciate the advice on the hardness of the gem. It was something I was wondering about but as I haven''t met with any jewelers yet no one had advised me against it.

I will further focus my search on the tourmaline. Oddly, out of all the sites I checked out (taken from a list of colored gemstone websites on a past PS thread) precisiongems wasn''t on it! I will go over there right now...

 

[Clairitek]

From precisioncut gems...

What do you think of gem277?

6th stone down in this link:
http://www.precisiongem.com/html/html/GreenTourmaline.html

$128 sounds pretty nice to me!

 

[Harriet]

Are you wedded to a yellow gold setting? If so, peridot is your best bet. The other gems you mentioned are lovely, but I would not want the gold to bring out any undesirable yellow secondaries. Look into tsavorite as well.

 

[Clairitek]

Date: 11/3/2008 12:08:46 AM
Author: Harriet
Are you wedded to a yellow gold setting? If so, peridot is your best bet. The other gems you mentioned are lovely, but I would not want the gold to bring out any undesirable yellow secondaries. Look into tsavorite as well.

Nope, not totally married to the yellow gold setting. My mother has mostly yellow gold jewelery but she also has a white gold eternity band with princess cut stones. She doesn''t have an engagement ring or wedding band she wears daily so really any color metal will do.

 

[T L]

Date: 11/3/2008 12:03:03 AM
Author: Clairitek
Thanks so much for the input tourmaline_lover! I just found your posts on the ebay vendors thread and now I am also quite taken with this bright orange

My friend has a yellow gold and peridot ring and I started out with peridot in mind for this ring because I loved the color combination but then I saw the mint garnet on Jeff White''s website and was just speechless. I appreciate the advice on the hardness of the gem. It was something I was wondering about but as I haven''t met with any jewelers yet no one had advised me against it.

I will further focus my search on the tourmaline. Oddly, out of all the sites I checked out (taken from a list of colored gemstone websites on a past PS thread) precisiongems wasn''t on it! I will go over there right now...

Wow, thanks for the kind words. I always feel so obnoxious with my whining and complaining here about things.

Email Gene at precisiongem.com about that gemstone. He can tell you more about it if it''s too dark, what the secondary hues are (blue, yellow), etc. . . Everyone raves about his stones and their cutting, so I think you can''t go wrong for the money with his merchandise. The stone is very pretty, but you just want to make sure there''s not a lot of extinction (blackness to the stone). That tends to be an issue with most tourmalines, but there are bright and lively stones.

Paraibainternational has lots of variety and green stones, but they''re kind of expensive. At least you can look at their website and get some good ideas. I like that they show a video of the rotating stone in each of their listings.

 

[Clairitek]

Email sent to Gene... I am currently awaiting a reply.

I dug up a few more on ebay-

Green garnet

Interesting pale green garnet
Not sure about what color metal I would set that in though... Yellow might overwhelm it. Rose? Would that be really strange?

Thinking about bidding on this spess for myself for a future project

 

[MMT]

Did you buy the mint tourmaline? I really like that one and the green sapphire.

 

[Harriet]

Date: 11/3/2008 7:51:58 AM
Author: tourmaline_lover
I always feel so obnoxious with my whining and complaining here about things.

I''ve never ''heard'' you whine or complain here.

 

[Clairitek]

I heard back from Gene at Precisiongems but he has to go home to check out the stone so he said he would be getting back to me later tonight. He did say that the black spots were just tough lighting, not anything going on with the stone. I will probably buy that stone and then pray I can find a reasonable setting to put it in. I plan on meeting with a jeweler this week to discuss the project.

I love the green sapphire too but I prefer the cushion cut and I think my mother will too. I am going to have to keep green sapphire in mind for the future.

 

[Clairitek]

Date: 11/3/2008 12:03:03 AM
Author: Clairitek
Thanks so much for the input tourmaline_lover! I just found your posts on the ebay vendors thread and now I am also quite taken with this bright orange

Whoops... I suppose this is the hazard of posting in the middle of the night. I was beginning to say that I was quite taken with a bright orange spess. I ended up bidding on it and lost at the last second. I am a horrible ebayer.

I am watching about 10 different stones right now for myself... Just add me to the list of budding colored stone addicts! Its all your fault PS!

Either way... back to the green stone hunt.

 

[Harriet]

Date: 11/3/2008 12:24:58 PM
Author: Clairitek
Whoops... I suppose this is the hazard of posting in the middle of the night. I was beginning to say that I was quite taken with a bright orange spess. I ended up bidding on it and lost at the last second. I am a horrible ebayer.

I am watching about 10 different stones right now for myself... Just add me to the list of budding colored stone addicts! Its all your fault PS!

Either way... back to the green stone hunt.

 

[Clairitek]

Date: 11/3/2008 12:36:50 PM
Author: Harriet

Date: 11/3/2008 12:24:58 PM

Author: Clairitek

Whoops... I suppose this is the hazard of posting in the middle of the night. I was beginning to say that I was quite taken with a bright orange spess. I ended up bidding on it and lost at the last second. I am a horrible ebayer.

I am watching about 10 different stones right now for myself... Just add me to the list of budding colored stone addicts! Its all your fault PS!


Either way... back to the green stone hunt.

Its called being a grad student who SHOULD be writing a paper but instead I am lurking on ebay.

 

[LD]

Have you considered Zultanite (also called Diaspore)? During the day it''s a beautiful apple green and a good stone will then shift under incandescent light to a rose pink/peach colour. It''s incredibly pretty. It''s normally eye clean too.

 

[Clairitek]

No I hadn''t considered it but I will do some searching around for that stone as well. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[LD]

Thought you might like to see a real life specimen (if you know what I mean)! Please bear in mind that this gemstone doesn''t photograph well! The daylight (lighter colour) is actually a gorgeous pale apple green and glints like mad! The colour under electric light, as you can see, moves to a peachy/rose colour. Actually, when the light is just fading it''s probably at its prettiest because it''s green with glints of red!

 

[Clairitek]

It looks like no matter who cuts my stone I will be getting a green tourmaline. I am now in contact with Dan from customecutgems and Gene from precisiongems. They are about the same price so I have no idea how I will choose... Advice?

In related news I just purchased my FIRST colored gem! I 1 carat oval cut spess. It didn''t cost much but I am excited about it.

All mine... now what to do with it?
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110304921123&ssPageName=ADME:B:EOIBSA:US:1123

I''ll post pics once I get the stone. Now I am off to play some flag football and daydream some more about lovely colorful pretties.

 

[marcy]

Your spessartite looks pretty. I love the green sapphire too. I have a 6mm round one in YG and really like it. Good luck getting your tourmaline cut.

 

[Clairitek]

Date: 11/3/2008 2:56:55 PM
Author: LovingDiamonds
Thought you might like to see a real life specimen (if you know what I mean)! Please bear in mind that this gemstone doesn''t photograph well! The daylight (lighter colour) is actually a gorgeous pale apple green and glints like mad! The colour under electric light, as you can see, moves to a peachy/rose colour. Actually, when the light is just fading it''s probably at its prettiest because it''s green with glints of red!

It mystifies me that a stone can perform such tricks! I can''t believe that is the SAME stone in both pictures. Amazing. Thank you for sharing that with me. I will have to hunt one down for myself at some point.