The Definitive Guide to the World of Color in Tourmaline Gemstones

The Definitive Guide to the World of Color in Tourmaline Gemstones

Why Our Gemstones?

My Effort to Cut a Quality Gemstone.

Over twenty years ago my love of color brought me back to faceting gemstones. I had not, worked in stone for many years. Years crowded with family, work and other crafts. But nothing I created could compare with gemstones when it comes to pure intense color. I checked out the relatively new world, to me, of the internet and soon realized that if I ever wanted to collect gemstones I would have to cut them myself. My path forward ended up being the purchase of a completely new faceting machine and the purchase of small piles of poor quality rough gemstones.

I am sure that there are many faceters that relish the challenge of cutting extremely precise and complicated gemstones. They may love color or not and win awards, or be focused on making acceptable commercial gemstones. But they are seldom very interested in the vast world of color that exists in gemstones that are not very commercial. While the tantalizing promise of something different in color and only a moderate commercial interest pushed me to reach out to purchase as much different color as I could. I certainly did not turn down the opportunity to purchase the most beautiful color in the commercial world, but I never really wanted to cut large lots of rough with one color even if it was economically lucrative.

I not only want the widest range of tourmaline colors, I wanted to cut and polish them as well as I could. I realized that many of my individual efforts that I made would not be significant or even noticeable in the commercial world, but I was cutting these gems for me. I limited most of my cutting to relatively simple traditional patterns. This made it easier for me to cut superior gems that focused on color not technical brilliance in cutting. To make any style of gemstone snap, you need flat and well polished facets. To attain that goal, I spent most of five years working with a wide range of laps and polish to perfect my polishing technique. It is time consuming and nature and my limitations still do not permit my polishing to be without blemish, but I try with every facet. And I get a quality gemstone that satisfies me.

I think the gems in my site can speak for themselves about the beauty in tourmaline. It is a very personal journey for me, to at least bring pictures of them into your world.