Synthetic sapphires?

[glitterata]

A friend of mine wants to get his wife a sapphire engagement ring, since she dislikes diamonds and loves blue. They have very little money and other priorities for spending it; in fact, they recently got married without rings. So although they would theoretically like a natural stone, if there''s a way to get something that looks just as good for a lot less money, that''s what they want to do.

Are there synthetic sapphires that look as good as natural ones? Where would my friend go to find them? They live in the NYC area. Color is very important to both of them--they want a rich, intense blue, not too dark and not too light.

Also, in general, does anyone know a good, inexpensive place in NYC to shop for colored stones?

 

[strmrdr]

They can look like the best of the naturals for very little money.
Id have Micheal E custom cut one if it was me.

Its funny you can spend many thousands of dollars on a top sapphire and the only place you might find an equal to it is in a couple hundred dollar synthetic.

That said there are various levels of sythetics with flux and hydrothermal produced being prefered over flame fusion sythetics.
Flame fusion are the cheapest sometimes only a 10-15 dollars for a ring size stone.
Where a well cut flux could run into the $200 range.

 

[glitterata]

Thanks, Storm! I was hoping you''d reply.

Do you know what method Chatham uses? Do you know how the synthetic sapphires that Wink sells are made?

 

[strmrdr]

Date: 7/5/2005 1:09:35 PM
Author: glitterata
Thanks, Storm! I was hoping you''d reply.


Do you know what method Chatham uses? Do you know how the synthetic sapphires that Wink sells are made?

Chatham uses the flux method.

Wink''s are also flux method from russian produced rough if I remember right.

Micheal E uses flux method from russian produced rough.

imho Chatham is over priced but pretty.