We’ve looked before at how sapphires for. Now let’s check out Montana sapphires – North America’s biggest known deposit of gem-quality stones – and see how gemologists manage to get every bit of color they possibly can from each sapphire – even the green ones!
Diamonds aren’t the only mantle-associated gems. Most of the upper mantle is made out of peridotite, a combination of olivine and pyroxene. It is named after the very famous gemstone it contains–peridot.
Small Herkimer diamonds are usually the best ones, but it’s enormously satisfying to watch someone extract this huge, faceted crystal from the surrounding rock.
As Christie’s says, it’s not just about the eggs — Featured image: Fabergé egg, opsa at Pixabay. Public domain.
How would you choose the world’s top five diamonds? Here are the ones I think are the world’s best.
Watch as red zircons are dug out of the soil in Ratanakiri, Cambodia, and turned into sky-blue gemstones by heat treatment in somebody’s back-yard mini-furnace.
