January’s birthstone, garnet, is known for its impressive variety of eye-catching colors, which can be almost any color of the rainbow. Garnets occur in green (demantoid and tsavorite), orange (spessartine), red (almandine and pyrope), and purplish red (rhodolite), plus a few rare garnets even change color under different types of light. But color is far from a garnet’s only attractive feature.

GIA’s Garnet Buying Guide offers key pointers on what quality factors to look for, and helps you differentiate between some of the garnet varieties, for example two of the green garnets: tsavorite and demantoid.

Click the garnet buying guide image to see a larger view. Bookmark and share!

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Think of every passing year as an opportunity to celebrate with your birthstone. In fact, people have been wearing birthstone jewelry since the 15^th century in Poland, when they were encouraged to own all 12. And while birthstone secrets and lore can be found right here on our blog, today we share what makes YOUR birthstone a powerful statement of your finest qualities.

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Our favorite leading ladies stepped onto the red carpet in vibrantly colored gowns bedecked with glittering jewels for this year’s 85th Academy Awards. Yesterday, we covered breathtaking blue gemstones, which enhanced bold sapphire-colored gowns worn by celebrities such as Lilly Collins and Jennifer Hudson. Today, we’ve compiled a list of colored gemstones in celebration of the glamorous demonstrations of color Oscars fashion has inspired.

Carmen Electra wearing Sutra Ruby and Diamond Earrings.

A perennial Oscars favorite, bold crimson hues were donned by Jennifer Aniston, Sally Field and Olivia Munn, just to name a few. GIA experts have selected some stunning red gemstones that could have elegantly amplified their ensembles.

Ruby

Fun fact: The color must be neither too dark nor too light to be considered finest quality. If the color is too dark it has a negative effect on the stone’s brightness. At the other extreme, if the color is too light, the stone is considered pink sapphire, even if color strength or intensity is high.

Ruby is the most valuable variety of the corundum mineral species and can command the highest per-carat price of any colored stone. Corundum has excellent toughness, and is harder than any other natural gem except diamond.  Color is the most significant factor affecting a ruby’s value. The finest ruby has a pure, vibrant red to slightly purplish-red color, and vivid color saturation.

Dona Dirlam, Director of GIA’s Richard T. Liddicoat Gemological Library and Information Center expresses her admiration for red gem varieties. “The world of red gems is fascinating, and each stone tells its own story. Ruby – the king of red gems – will always be a classic choice, while red garnet offers a durable alternative that is great for everyday wear.”

Red Garnet

Because rough is plentiful, rhodolite is often cut by designer lapidaries into buff tops and free-form cuts with curved surfaces instead of facets.

Garnets are a set of closely related minerals that form a group, resulting in gemstones in almost every color, although red garnets are the most well-known. Rhodolite is the most valuable of the red garnets, and ranges from a dark, purplish raspberry red to a light reddish purple. In the best gems, the tone is medium to medium dark. Pyrope and almandite combine to form rhodolite and other red garnet varieties, but can also exist as separate species. Although both pyrope and almandite were important as gems in the past, mixtures of these two garnet species fill the red garnet marketplace today. Garnets are often remarkably free of inclusions that might reduce clarity and brilliance.

According to fashion reports, a pastel palette took the Oscar for red carpet fashion this year. Amy Adams, Anne Hathaway and Jennifer Lawrence all wore stunning gowns in muted pastel shades, sure to spark Spring fashion trends moving forward. Commenting on the trend is no less an authority than GIA’s museum curator, Terri Ottaway.

“Pastel-colored gems such as aquamarine and morganite – both varieties of beryl – are a great way to lighten up a spring wardrobe. They’re popular gems and can really make a fashion statement.”

Below are some spectacular pastel-colored gemstones selected by GIA to pair with your favorite spring pieces.

Aquamarine

Fun fact: Aquamarine’s blue colors are reflected in its name, which comes from the Latin for “sea water.”

Aquamarine is the green-blue to blue variety of the mineral beryl. Its color is usually a light pastel greenish blue. The color of untreated aquamarine is often strongly greenish; heat treatment usually gives it a more bluish appearance. Aquamarine crystals are known to be large in size and relatively clean and well-formed, making them particularly valuable to collectors of mineral specimens.

Morganite

Fun fact: George Kunz, then-Tiffany’s colored stone specialist and a noted gem scholar, named the discovery after J.P. Morgan, an American banker and gem enthusiast.

Pink beryl is known as morganite in the gem trade, or even “pink emerald,” although many in the trade consider the latter term to be misleading. The gem was first discovered in Madagascar in 1911. Strong hues in morganite are rare, and gems usually have to be fairly large to achieve the finest color. Morganite’s color range includes pink, rose, peach and salmon. The gem is almost always heat-treated to improve the pink color. The resulting color is stable and won’t fade.

Which is your favorite red carpet-worthy gemstone option for Spring?

The post Colored Gems at the Oscars: Part 2 appeared first on GIA 4Cs Blog.

Blame it on St. Valentine, but February is synonymous with the color red. Giving your special someone a red gemstone jewelry piece would be the ultimate token of affection to mark the upcoming holiday dedicated to romance. When considering purchasing a red gemstone such as ruby, garnet, or red diamond, there are a few key facts and considerations to keep in mind.

Ruby
Ruby is often referred to as the king of gemstones and is a variety of the mineral corundum. Like its sister, gem sapphire, rubies are second only to diamonds in hardness, which makes them a good choice for everyday wear. When purchasing a ruby, look for mixed-cut ovals and cushions as these cuts bring out the vibrant red of the stone. Rubies can display a rare optical phenomena called asterism, which has star-like rays. When shopping for a ruby, it’s important to make sure you know what you are buying. Synthetic rubies are popular and many are sold in jewelry today and most natural rubies are heat treated to enhance color. Additionally, other gemstones, including spinels and pink sapphires, can be mistaken for rubies, so it’s best to look at the gemological identification report before making a significant purchase.

Garnet
Garnets come in a multitude of colors including green and yellow, but are usually associated with the deep red variety from the minerals Almandite, Pyrope or Rhodolite. With a hardness of 7 to 7.5 on the Mohs scale, garnets are durable enough for daily wear.

Red Diamond
Natural-color red diamonds are among the rarest available. Color intensity often equates to higher value, so the purest and most saturated red diamonds are the most desirable. Red diamonds are not color graded according to the D-to-Z color scale. Colored, or “fancy-color” diamonds, are rated on a color scale that ranges from “Faint” to “Fancy Deep”. GIA produces a Colored Diamond Grading Report that many retailers will provide to accompany the diamond.

Please join us here later this week for the next red gemstone lineup! We’d love to know which of these red gemstones appeals to you the most, and why, so we welcome your comments.

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Garnet, January’s birthstone, is one of the most diverse gemstones. It comes in an extraordinary range of color, although it’s most commonly known for its rich shade of red. In fact, the name garnet is thought to be derived from the word pomegranate, because the more commonly found deep red varieties of the gemstone resemble pomegranate seeds. Garnet varieties and species actually come in a rainbow of colors, including orange, yellow and green. While rare, these gemstones can also come in blue and violet.

January’s birthstone actually comes in a rainbow of colors.

This gemstone have a long and interesting history. Deep red garnets have been appreciated since biblical times, while a green variety, called tsavorite, was first discovered in 1971 in Kenya’s Tsavo National Park. When worn, garnet is thought to bring one a sense of calm.

“25-leaves” set with 27-carat weight of grossular garnet and 15-carats of diamonds in blackened 18k gold. Gift of Dr. Gary R and Barbara E. Hansen.

Garnet is the birthstone for January and may be celebrated in its many varieties, providing an array of choices for gemstone enthusiasts.

Check out the variety of garnets in the GIA Celebrates Birthstones exhibit at the GIA Carlsbad campus. Schedule a free tour 24 hours in advance by contacting guestservices@gia.edu; calling 800-421-7250, ext. 4116 or 760-603-4116; or visiting www.gia.edu.

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For most people, when they think of January’s birthstone, they think of a deep red gemstone. But did you know that garnet can also be found in shades of yellow, orange, and even green?

In fact, the garnet family is comprised of various minerals representing almost every color of the rainbow. One of the more common garnets is Almandite, which appears reddish orange to red or slightly purplish red to reddish purple. Garnets in the green and yellow color range are usually composed of the mineral Andradite. Spessartite, or Spessartine, produces a lively shade of orange and is one of the more difficult variations to find.

(far left) 19.12-carat red purple Almandite, (middle) 1.67-carat yellowish green Andradite, (right) 5.13-carat orange Spessartine.

Other garnet minerals include Rhodolite (light to dark purplish red through reddish purple), Pyrope (red), Malaya (orange), and Grossularite, which may be light to dark green (aka Tsavorite), light to dark yellow to reddish orange, and there’s even a rare colorless variety.

Garnet is not the hardest of gemstones, so the safest way to care for a garnet is to clean it with warm and soapy water. Ultrasonic cleaning is usually safe unless the garnet has inclusions.

Steam cleaning this gemstone is risky and not advised.

16.02-carat, cabochon shaped Andradite Garnet.

Read up on the various roles garnet has played throughout history.

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The garnet is actually a group of several minerals that have been used since the Bronze Age as gemstones and abrasives. There are six common garnet minerals – and several other rare species. The most common garnets are  almandine, andradite, grossular, pyrope, spessartine and uvarovite The name “garnet” comes from 14th century Middle English word gernet meaning ‘dark red’,

The deep red transparent stones we normally associate with gemstone garnets are the Almandine garnets. However, Garnet actually displays the greatest variety of color of any mineral, occurring in every color except blue.

For Gemstone worthy garnets in other colors there are the green “demantoid” and “tsavorite,” the orangy red “hessonite” and the pink/red “rhodolite.” Besides brilliance and attractive colors, garnets sometimes exhibit optical phenomena such as asterism (a star-shaped pattern of reflections), chatoyancy (a “cat’s-eye” seen in reflected light), or a color change when viewed under different types of lighting.

Red garnets were the most commonly used gemstones in the Late Antique Roman world, and of the “barbarian” peoples who took over the territory of the Western Empire. They were especially used inlaid in gold cells in the cloisonné technique, a style often just called garnet cloisonné, found from Anglo-Saxon England.

Because the chemical composition of garnet varies, the atomic bonds in some species are stronger than in others. As a result, this mineral group shows a range of hardness on the of about 6.5 to 7.5.

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