precision cut – The Gemstone Project

Market Watch: Spinel

Posted on August 29, 2016August 28, 2016 by grayspinel

Today’s blog will be short. I have a huge queue of projects lined up that need my attention, and never enough time to do everything I want to do (hint hint: GIA GG).

Over the years I have gained a reputation for being someone who loves spinel. It’s true, I do. Which is evidenced by my spinel engagement ring, and maintaining a pretty decent personal collection of spinels. And not only that, but somehow people who discover gray spinel typically find me as well.

Side note: It’s funny, but when you start google image searching “gray spinel” several of the pictures I have taken over the years are top results.

Now, it was just last month that AGTA and JA declared spinel an alternative birthstone for August, but already the price for spinel has absolutely sky rocketed. Two months ago I could buy spinel on the retail market for cheaper than the new wholesale prices for spinel. This is especially evident with pinks and reds (as they are always the ones to jump in price first!) but it has even trickled down to the gray spinels.

Once upon a time, you could buy gray spinel for $5/ct, if that. Dealers and miners were just thrilled to sell them for something – they were once considered a step above gravel. But now, I am seeing prices that are more than triple of the prices seen just a few months ago. Retail pricing on darker spinels over 2cts is currently clocking in at around $900/ct. And that’s when you can find them!

So, the point of this post is that if you are in the market for a spinel, of any color, you should buy sooner rather than later. These prices are going to go way up, and I doubt that we will ever see them go back down now that spinel has been introduced to the public eye.

The Vivant Ring

Posted on May 23, 2016May 22, 2016 by grayspinel

One thing I sometimes struggle with is keeping it simple. Sometimes I find myself adding details and thinking, “This is perfect!” and then going back and thinking, “Why did I add so much?!” I always try to remember that Coco Chanel quote:

“Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off.”

Wise words from an impeccably fashionable woman. So while the Vivant necklace is a modern take with Art Deco appeal, I decided to keep the Vivant ring an echo of some of the details from the necklace, and lend towards classic simplicity.

The stones chosen for this setting were chosen to add a little bit of drama via color, with a neon pink Mahenge spinel, and two antique Old Mine Cut cushions (because antique cuts in diamonds are my favorites!) as the perfect classic accents.

Typically one of my favorite views, because it shows off so many details of a ring setting, and how they flow together.

The ring ends up at 2.64ctw of diamonds (antiques are .99ctw, melee are .10ctw) and spinel (1.55ct) and was made of 18kt white gold. This setting will be available (and tremendously adaptable!) for your own stone or stones, of any shape and size. I am also able to source stones, because pairs are not exactly easy to find sometimes!

And ending with the fluidity of the shank, and the slight split shank transition.

Inside the Industry: Engagement Rings

Posted on April 4, 2016April 3, 2016 by grayspinel

I originally was thinking of the “Real Housewives of _____” series when I had this idea for the blog. I’ve never actually watched even an episode of any of the shows, but their jewelry seems to have a prominent presence in the show, as I will occasionally hear about various huge diamond engagement rings from news outlets.

Engagement rings are deeply personal items, sometimes they have hidden messages, birthstones, special secrets that just the couple knows about. Every engagement ring is a promise and a symbol of a union, and are often the most important piece of jewelry a couple will share.

So I decided to reach out to some gem cutters and dealers to see what people wear who are surrounded by stunning gems and jewelry all of the time.

All photography within this post is the property of person whose ring it is, and their images and stories are being used with permission.

Dan and Cynthia Stair of Custom Gemstones met when Cynthia started collecting the gemstones that Dan was cutting.

What is Cindi’s engagement ring?
About a four carat pink sapphire in a platinum and diamond halo. The funny thing is, I bought the ring to take the stone out and recut it, but was told “no”. I figure if it ever gets a little scuffed, I’ll “fix” it.

Roger and Ginger Dery of Spectral Gems

What is Ginger’s engagement ring?
Blue sapphire, Sri Lankan, a piece I reconditioned with a final weight of 6.33ct. It is heated, and has an AGL report, of course.

Geoffrey and Alexandra Watt of Mayer & Watt

What is Alexandra’s engagement ring?
3.50cts 8.5mm square cushion peach no heat Padparadscha Ceylon sapphire with white gold shank … Rose gold head … Platinum filigree down the side with 3mm round Alex’s. Her anniversary band is rose gold with diamonds, and the ring was designed so the band would fit inside it.

Why Alexandrites?

Well I love Alexandrites and so my wife by default likes them too, and wanted a big one but we can’t afford it! So I promised she would eventually get one…and I put them secretly in her ring. She designed it but I snuck them in. Plus her name is Alexandra, so it has double meaning behind it being in her ring.

Jaimeen and Nattalie Shah of Prima Gems

What is Nattalie’s engagement ring?
A 1.5ct round tsavorite and diamond ring. The center measures 6.6mm.

Nattalie and Jaimeen’s engagement ring story is so wonderful, I just had to let her share it in her own words:
Almost six years ago, my husband (who was obviously my boyfriend at the time) called his mother in India and asked her to design and make a ring for me. He asked her to make a ring with a Tsavorite because this stone holds a lot of significance to him. He knew that I had teased him that I would love any engagement ring as long as it wouldn’t turn my finger green (haha). I love my engagement ring and I really feel that it’s so special to know that this ring was made just for me.

If you’re in the business and would like me to share a photo of your/your partner’s engagement ring please reach out to me!

Thank you so much to all of you for sharing such a special piece of your history together!

Feature: Dan and Cindi Stair

Posted on March 14, 2016March 13, 2016 by grayspinel

Daniel and Cynthia Stair are the owners and gem cutters at Custom Gemstones and I have known them for many years, after first striking up a conversation when I was looking for my engagement ring stone. I recently reached out to Dan with a whole bunch of questions and he answered every single one! Something that I really love about their website is that they take before and after pictures and it’s fascinating to see how the rough turns out, and recently started posting video of every single stone that goes up on their website.

How much of the cutting do you each do?
I cut full-time and do one or two per day. Cindi works at the local hospital, so she only has time to cut a few stones each month.

What are your favorite stones to cut?
That’s a tough question. If I had to pick one, it would probably be natural sapphires. However, I really like tourmalines, spinels and garnets too. I tend to favor higher RI or more dispersive gemstones, regardless of the hardness of the stone or the fact that harder stones take a little longer to cut. They also last longer in jewelry, so that’s something I feel good about. I don’t like to hear that people have rings made and then the stones get all scuffed up.

Do you have a favorite shape you like to cut? Or a favorite cut design?
No. I don’t like cutting pears, but other than that, don’t really have a favorite. Variety is a good thing when it comes to cutting stones.

Do you typically cut more from diagrams or more by instinct?
Actually, I only use diagrams less than 10% of the time. I usually cut using a “style” such as step cutting as with emeralds or Asscher cuts, or brilliant cutting as with Portuguese, standard round brilliants, etc. I also do a lot of radiant or princess type cuts if the stone is shallowish, and scissors cuts if it’s deeper in shape. While I work, I figure it out as I go and make notes about the angles, index gear (rotational) settings, etc. as needed so I can remember what I did when I go back to prepolish, then polish the stone.

How did you get started cutting gems? What did each of you do before?
I was a photographer, writer and graphic designer for a large fishing lure manufacturer, and also did a lot of work for other area business and print shops when they needed full color printing done. Back in the early 1990’s, I was probably one of the very first people to successfully use a desktop color computer for production of things like catalogs, magazine ads, etc. Cindi was a housewife for many years and a gem collector. She started cutting stones about ten years ago. I started in 1998 if I remember correctly.

What’s your favorite type of customer?
I don’t really have a favorite type of customer other than maybe people working on engagement ring projects because it’s fun to be a part of that, or gemologists because it’s nice to work with someone who knows a lot about gemstones.

What’s the percentage split between commissions vs what you choose?
It’s gotten to be about 50/50. Right now, we’re backlogged about a month with other peoples stones to cut, but also have to keep the ebay store and regular website interesting. I try to cut one of my own, one for someone else, one of my own, etc.

I noticed that you added videos of your stones to each listing. What brought that on?
I was getting a lot of request for “more photos”, particularly from pricescope.com members. What they don’t realize is how much time that takes and often, they were more looking for reasons to not buy a stone than anything else. So, I decided to try videos because that shows so much more about how a stone looks in person that still photos alone. Since I started doing that, I have noticed a huge reduction in requests for additional pictures as well as a major decrease in how many people get stones in the mail then decide to return them because they aren’t exactly as expected. Neither the photos nor the videos are perfect, but between those and the written description, a person should be able to get a pretty thorough idea of what a stone will be like in person.

You seem to have gained quite the reputation in recent years for recutting less than perfect stones, or damaged stones. How did that come about?
I used to send all those projects to other cutters, but started getting complaints that stones were being held for six months or more and the cutters were not returning emails. So, I finally decided to do the work myself rather than referring people to others that did not provide a good service. Since I have cut thousands of stones, and have that experience, I was able to develop some cutting concepts to fix a lot of the commercially cut stones without losing a ton of weight or having to do total recuts. The tops are usually not too badly cut. The pavilions are almost always 90% of the problem so learning to fix those has been the real key to improving the stones. As far as reputation goes, I really can’t say much about that other than I always try to do a good job and keep the overall value of the stone in mind so people don’t lose money on their gemstone investments.

How long does each stone take to cut? Do certain shapes take longer to cut?
Most smaller stones that cut to be 2 carats or less take 2-3 hours to cut. Bigger stones take longer, but not proportionally so. For example, a two carat finished garnet might take three hours, and a 10 carat more like 5 hours. simple shapes like rounds, squares and emerald cuts are fastest. Shapes with long curved sides take a bit longer. Examples would be ovals, pears, marquise cuts, etc.

What’s each of your favorite colors? Do you tend to try to cut those more often?
After all the years of graphic arts and now colorful gemstones, I have no favorite color. I don’t, however, like olive green or brownish pink colors. Cindi’s favorite colors are pink and green. She tends to like all colors, even some of the “ugly” ones, except red.

How often do you cut stones and keep them?
Me, less than one per year. Cindi, every few months. I very rarely keep a stone. I have a nearly flawless emerald, some opals and a blue to pink color change garnet that I’ve kept. After 17 or so years, I only have about 10 stones total…if that. Cindi, on the other hand has hundreds.

Does Dan have any jewelry made with the stones he has (Or Cindi) cut?
Yes. I have a silver ring Cindi made for me using a welo opal and a Tripps setting. I also have a small blue Australian sapphire that I cut in my simple, comfort fit wedding band.

How do you manage working together as a couple? How did Cindi get started and involved?
We both love gemstones in general and met when she start collecting stones I was cutting. Oddly, we work together very well and almost never fight or argue about anything. Cindi got started cutting gemstones as a hobby, which is how I got started also.

What is your favorite stone that you ever cut? Did you sell it or keep it?
I’m not sure I have a favorite, but the first one I ever kept for myself was an almost flawless, untreated Colombian emerald that even shows dispersion or spectral color flashes in sunlight. I am fond of this one because of the clarity. The somewhat odd step cut pear shape isn’t necessarily what I like about it. Under magnification, I could only spot three little specks of “jardin”.

What’s the weirdest stone you’ve ever cut?
Cindi has a really unusual gray tourmaline that is almost a charcoal color and super dispersive that I cut about 13 years ago. The thing has big spectral flashes coming out of a completely gray colored stone.

Whatever happened to those corpse colored tourmalines you had listed? Weird as it may sound, I’m sorry I missed out on them…
The first of the two “corpse” colored tourmalines was purchased by a nurse (funny huh?). I can’t remember who bought the second one.

A huge thank you to Dan for taking so much time to answer all of my questions and being so frank with his answers. Most of the images in this post were taken from the website, of some gemstones that are currently for sale (minus the pear emerald and the “Ugly Tourmaline”!) I have a particular weakness for Dan’s step cuts!

Building a Gemstone Collection

Posted on January 4, 2016January 4, 2016 by grayspinel

Over the past several years I have built a wonderful collection of jewels with a client of mine. She started out pretty slowly, but about 5 years later, through a lot of time, trial and error and wading through a pool of contacts, she has managed to build one of the most beautiful and thorough collections I’ve ever seen (in a collection that’s not in a museum, at least!).

One of the most important factors we learned in building her collection is that sometimes stones will pop out at you at the most unexpected times. You may have been searching for a fantastic blue sapphire, and stumbled on the perfect ruby instead. I would absolutely jump on the ruby rather than keep pursuing the sapphire. Bump the sapphire down a notch on the priority list, but keep an eye out for it. In other words, when opportunity knocks, answer the door.

Beyond making opportunistic buys, it’s important to have a plan moving forward as you build your collection.

Strategies for building a stunning gemstone and/or jewelry collection:

Make a list of the gems/jewelry you absolutely want. Try your best to order this list according to your personal priorities (see 2-9).
Keep in mind this list is going to grow and change as your expectations and desires change.
Color. What colors do you want? What colors would you wear? Is there any special significance to colors/types of stones?
Hardness. Are you hard on your rings? Do you need to be limited to the very hardest stones? How does that limit you color-wise? Are you willing to wear something sparingly in order to have that color in your collection?
Some of the best overall collections I’ve seen have a full variety, a rainbow of color. But some collections have a concentrated color group – a friend who is a huge fan of blue green for instance, may build a small army of blue-green stones in a variety of shades, while other colors in their collection may appear sorely neglected.
Know yourself. What makes you get butterflies in your stomach? What makes you gasp in delight? Is it a certain variety of stone? Or a certain color?
Keep budget in mind and know where you want to make concessions. Things like cut and clarity can help stretch the budget.
Keep your setting budget and wants in mind. Sometimes people balk at spending more on a setting than on a stone. Know what your priorities are! For some people (myself included!) the setting costs and the stone cost ratio doesn’t matter, it’s the end piece that has to make your heart sing.
Do you want fewer more expensive items or a larger number of cheaper items?
Try to finish some of your pieces. You can go down a rabbit-hole of buying gems or settings and never complete anything (unless, of course, your goal is to collect gemstones and settings!).

Just keep in mind that beautiful collections don’t necessarily grow overnight. Gemstones are often very hard to track down, especially as you reach for more high end or rare stones. Building a collection takes time and requires patience, but is well worth it in the end.

In the event that building your collection hits a wall, feel free to reach out to me for help with new rocks to overturn or who knows – one of my contacts may have just what you are looking for!

Musings, Mise En Place, Pastry

Posted on November 2, 2015November 1, 2015 by grayspinel

Back when I used to be a pastry chef, I struggled with cake decorating quite a bit. I felt like there was often too much empty space to fill up. I think that it’s one of the reasons I loved creating composed dessert plates so much, I could create the dessert items and they turned into the decoration for the plate, rather than covering the dessert in decorations. I have always struggled with creating something completely from scratch – having a huge blank canvas to fill, rather than having at least a starting point to grow from. You can’t grow a plant without a seed.

I remember with finding inspiration for a composed dessert, considering flavor profiles, and utilizing the colors that naturally came with those flavors as my starting points, and building from there. The dish that comes to mind is one made with cherry mousse and white peach mousse with a pistachio cake – using a barely there peach, a bright pink-red and the muted pistachio green to bring interest and brightness to the dessert, while also standing out among all of the chocolate/vanilla colors. The dessert in it’s entirety was beautiful, with wonderful colors that are organic to the item itself. Those flavors came from items that had interesting colors to begin with. Perhaps this is why I have such a hard time with filling space just to fill space – if the design element doesn’t make sense, if it doesn’t come from an organic place, why add it? And that is likely why I had (and have) such a hard time with decorating cakes. My own wedding cake had no decorations but chocolate covered strawberries and fresh berries on it.

Much like the beaten to death line from every traditionally trained chef I’ve ever met, “If it’s not edible, it doesn’t belong on the plate.” Period.

And in bringing up my pastry background, I think I’ve finally come to the realization that this is the place where I get my overthinking from. Mise en place is the French phrase that means “everything in it’s place” and it’s the very first thing that every cook is taught – before service, every item you will need for service must be ready. Preparation is absolutely everything in cooking, without preparation, you’d immediately be thrown in the weeds when service starts and you need something you don’t have at the ready.

So I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m much happier starting out with a smaller canvas to fill, the item of jewelry, typically with a built in starting point, rather than with the huge blank canvas of something such as a wedding cake, or even a birthday cake. It’s much easier to fill the space, to add just a little, and have that small element mean a lot more.

So along those lines, I have two more ring designs coming up that will be added to The Elle Collection, a true solitaire (no accent stones) named for one of my mentors, as well as a ring that will have some small diamond accented elements, but will be mostly a solitaire as well. I think that these will be added before the end of the year and I’m so excited about them!

I’ve been a bit all over the place this week, with some family stuff going on, and preparing for Halloween with a little kid and her activities to contend with, so I’ve been a bit overwhelmed with things outside, but also I will be debuting two new bands in November (rather than the end of October, as I had originally planned) because I’d been getting so much interest in one, and I’m just in love with the lines of the other.

There are less than 8 weeks left until Christmas, and while I will still be selling ready-made items until the week before, custom items are already going to be difficult to complete and have delivered by Christmas, if they aren’t already in the planning stages. I would recommend requesting any stock items from the Elle Collection to be ordered before Thanksgiving to arrive by Christmas, to allow for production time with the holiday rush.

I also wanted to mention that I do have a coupon on etsy running right now for 20% off orders over $100 running through November 7th (this coming Saturday!) so take advantage of it before it’s gone! The coupon code for that is “BURMESERUBY” (no quotes) and you can visit my Facebook page for the story behind the coupon.

Gem Blast: A Variety

Posted on July 27, 2015July 27, 2015 by grayspinel

So, I’ve been super busy. I currently have two ring setting prototypes heading towards production, and a necklace prototype I’m looking towards production on (trying to get the ring setting collection out first!), and about a dozen and a half other designs in my head/in the sketchbook that want to be made sooner rather than later.

Plus I’m attempting to try to come up with some stock product ideas for a jeweler I work with, several other custom projects for various clients, and that’s not touching on my interstate move.

I don’t really have a ton of time for a lot of blogging right now, but I’ve still been taking a lot of gem and jewelry photos. I figured I could post some of my recent favorites as a blog entry.

A vintage blue sapphire and diamond ring.

A couple of citrines against a blue rhinestone background.

Some spessartite garnet earrings. I keep considering repurposing these, but I haven’t quite decided yet.

An ideal cut diamond showing off a little bit of arrow action.

Some rose and yellow gold rings in my personal collection. I need to flesh this collection out some more!

Playing with light and a green garnet.

This Star 80 cut in a lavender spinel never fails to be interesting.

A Jeff White asscher spinel. A bevy of step cuts.

A trio of colorful haloed rings.

Some spinel rough. Not really facetable, but I like to keep it around because the colors are nice and I love the natural texture. It’s fun to play with.

A couple of spinels. The top is from Mahenge Tanzania, and the bottom is from Burma. The top is more reddish pink, the bottom is more pinkish red. Both have the neon glow that is considered ideal in the industry.

And last, but certainly not least, though uploading lost a lot of it’s beauty, the cut of this unheated aquamarine reminded me of the way water ripples.

Many of these will be available back in my etsy shop as soon as I’m back up and running.

You can likely look forward to another photo-heavy post next week, as I will be completely entrenched in my move (probably driving somewhere in Northern California) when the next blog posts, as I do typically try to plan most blog posts in advance.

Also, I’m hoping to post on August 9th – it’ll be my blog’s first birthday! Kind of amazing to me that I’ve kept it up for almost a year already.

Gem Blast: Tanzanite

Posted on June 29, 2015June 28, 2015 by grayspinel

I love purple-blues, and nothing does purple-blue quite like tanzanite. I’ve seen super saturated vivid purples and blues, but nothing gets to me like the violet/lavender/periwinkle shades between. I don’t think cuts get any better than this, but unfortunately, it makes it incredibly difficult to photograph perfectly cut gemstones. I spent an afternoon struggling with photographing it accurately. Here are some of my attempts to capture it’s beauty.

This is what it looks like when the camera is 18 inches away:

This is what it looks like when the camera lens is 1.5 inches away, and you photograph it head on:

Another macro pic, but at a slight angle to avoid the look from the previous picture.

Even less of an angle, still a lot of lens reflection:

Almost head on again, or also known as “how to turn a violet stone black”:

Oh hey, that looks pretty! Back to about a foot away:

Still showing some black, but at least it’s not black edge to edge!

Notice even the slightest angle can make a huge difference with a reduction in lens reflection.

This baby was snapped up quickly off of LoupeTroop, and it’s new owner was beyond thrilled with it (don’t blame her!) I hope that it will be cherished, as it is an exceptionally cut and colored stone! As lovely as some of these pictures make it look, it exceeds all of them in real life!

Viva Las Vegas! JCK 2015 Part 2!

Posted on June 11, 2015June 10, 2015 by grayspinel

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!

Jewelry Line Updates

Posted on June 1, 2015April 28, 2015 by grayspinel

I have been working madly on a variety of jewelry related and non-jewelry related issues, so I feel like many days have gone by where I haven’t been able to devote as much time as I wanted to to the things I really would like to spend my time on. One thing I have been working on is sketches and rendering, and naming said sketches, along with the pieces that go with them.

I have decided that my line of jewelry will first consist of several ring settings, and prototypes have been created or are currently being created for 5 settings. I would like to get three more settings into the queue for production, and then at least a three or four different bands.

So far only one band (non-stand alone) has been made into a prototype, and because the bands are after the ring settings in production, the band sketches have not been flowing as quickly as I’d like. I have another band that is more of a standalone band that has already been produced as a prototype.

I am most looking forward to the next phase of the jewelry line, the earring and necklace phase, in which I will debut earrings and necklace sketches that I have been working on for a very long time.

From there I would like to expand each of the lines, perhaps come up with some seasonal collections, one of a kind items and work on custom projects. I have a few ideas for some smaller rings that are less detailed and more in fashion with what I’m seeing out there right now.

The more movement I get in the etsy shop and on LoupeTroop, the more movement there will be towards developing my line of jewelry. I’m so excited and I can’t wait for more items to roll off of the production line! So far reviews have been very positive!

I wish I could share more images of my sketches, as I am quite proud of them, but I have copyright issues to contend with. As soon as I get to a more complete production line, I will start to debut them, one at a time. I’m hoping for late fall, or perhaps winter.

Here is one of my most “Marsala” gems, a precision cut spinel. I was hoping to set it for 2015, but it doesn’t look like that will work out. Marsala will still be en vogue next year, right?