Part 2. Or day 2. This is by far the most photo intensive post in this trilogy.
Friday
Naturally, after not getting to sleep until 3am, we slept in a bit, though that was not the plan. The plan was to get to JCK ASAP and start trawling through gemstones as early as we could. Instead we woke up and started looking at gemstones again, this time in daylight, before deciding it was time to eat. Of course I went for the color shifting 6ct violet sapphire first.
None of the other photos came out well, so I’ll skip them in an already picture heavy post.
Meeting with Amy Phillips of David Klass Jewelry
First thing we did after gathering our badges to go into the show was meet with Amy with David Klass Jewelry. She was showing us a wax for a ring David is making with the emerald from the first post. A client had been working with them on a diamond halo design, but had kind of hit a brick wall after a few CADs. I made a couple of tweaks to make the design a little bit more delicate and feminine. Since it’s not complete yet, I’ll keep it to a more boring view. I will say that I am so excited to see this project completed!
AGTA Show: Prima Gems
From seeing the wax, we went downstairs to the AGTA show, otherwise known as colored stones! So you already know I was so excited!
Of course I studied the map and made a beeline for Prima Gems. I browsed for a while, bumping into a few people that I recognized, including Yvonne Raley.
I just want to say that Nattalie Shah is an angel. My companion was seeking out red spinels and green garnets, but in the meantime, I had every single spinel pulled out of the case and had them spread out all over the counter. Not joking:
Here is a 12ct Mahenge Spinel, moderately included.
Same stone, being a show off.
While my companion was digging through red spinels, I was amusing myself going through a massive parcel of smaller red and pink spinels, pulling out stones that talked to me and putting them on a gem sorting tray. Most of these were the largest in there, but there was one that had color that just popped out at me.
The entirety of the parcel I was going through:
Playing with the UV flashlight.
Some of the red spinels that were being scrutinized.
No, really, scrutinized!
At one point, I got tired of red spinels, (though not tired enough to ask them to put them away!) and asked to see this really awesome blue-green tourmaline. This stone needs to be made into a necklace.
From the red spinels, we went to green garnets. Check out these mints!
In the meantime, I had put this little guy to the side for myself. Tiny, but you can see the neon color from across the room.
I’d forgive the shape for this color, the perfect blue-green for a mint.
Then Nattalie pulled out the UV light to play with a 4ct tsavorite. It was like Christmas in one stone!
Doing a mean impression of an emerald. Inclusions didn’t hinder the performance of this stone at all, though magnification makes the inclusions look worse than they are. This is one of those stones that doesn’t show it’s true beauty in photographs.
AGTA Show: Random vendors
At this point, we had spent so much time pouring over Prima stones after our late start, that we had run out of time, so we raced around just a bit looking at a few other booths. I took some photos of items that caught my eye.
A couple little rose cuts.
Colored stone melee, starting at .8mm to 3mm.
Untreated emerald rings.
Brazilian Paraiba. I should have inquired about pricing, but didn’t have time to stop.
Managed to have Gem 2000 pull some larger light pink sapphires to view for a client.
Ogled Gem 2000’s emeralds. The emeralds were everywhere!
And their spinels. Spinels were also everywhere.
I was also on the look out for blue sapphires for another client, so we checked these out with Gem 2000 as well,
The Other Roommate’s Arrival
After hopping on the shuttle and rushing to meet our other bling sister, we found her, and of course helped ourselves to her jewels. I know you’re surprised, but I took a bunch of photos:
Blue zircon.
Green sphene earring drops from Prima Gems.
Tanzanite double halo ring.
Vintage ruby and diamond ring, Love Affair Diamonds.
Ideal cut diamond earrings with ideal cut diamond halo jackets, ID Jewelry.
Mint garnet from Prima Gems
Spessartite garnet from Prima Gems
Ideal cut diamond
Dinner time: Texas de Brazil
So, by this point, it was time to grab dinner. We were picked up in a limo, and taken to Texas de Brazil. I hadn’t had Brazilian in several years, and this Brazilian put THAT Brazilian to shame. If you have the opportunity to go to one of these restaurants, do it. And hit up the salad bar in a major way, because it’s so so so good. Just as good as the meat, which is, of course, the main attraction.
The table in our private room was made of one giant piece of wood, and I loved the contrast with the lucite chairs.
My favorite dinner companion. Diamonds.
And to finish up the night, some random colored stone rings, including a couple of mine.
Yet again, we didn’t end up falling asleep until 2am, and there was no partying involved! The last day was fast approaching and I was determined to get to the show earlier than I had today.
Day 3! Blog post fast approaching! Tomorrow!
The Gemstone Project 