A wonderful new addition to the great gemstones of the world is the Blue Moon diamond, a 12.03 carat Fancy Vivid Blue, Internally Flawless diamond. The rough diamond was discovered in January 2014, at the Cullinan mine in South Africa, the same mine where the Star of Africa was discovered one hundred years earlier. The […]
Category Archives: Learn about diamonds
Articles, photos and hints & tips about diamonds and precious gemstones. This section includes articles about historic diamonds, updates from the world of gemmology, and an occasionally geeky focus on the chemistry of diamonds
The Polar Star diamond is a 41 carat cushion cut diamond, from the famous Golconda region in India. It was named after Polaris, the Northern Star. It has an eight pointed star arrangement on its lower pavilion, from which it derives its name. The symmetry of the cut is so precise that it can be […]
The Nassak diamond is a 43 carat diamond, discovered in India in the 15th century. Originally it weighed over 90 carats, but was re-cut several times over the years, most recently in 1940. It is an elongated triangular shape, with rounded corners, and described at the 1933 World’s fair in Chicago as the finest diamond […]
Following on from our recent post about the Three Brethren Jewel, another interesting diamond that is lost to history is the Florentine Diamond, a 137 carat yellow stone. It was first definitely documented in the collection of the Duke of Tuscany, the future Ferdinand II (a member of the Medici family), 1610-1670, though it was […]
The Three Brethren Jewel was a cloak clasp, set with gemstones, known to have existed in the 15th and 16th centuries. Made during the first decade of the 15th century, the Three Brethren jewel is an extremely mysterious and intriguing piece, whose value today, if it was still intact, would be incalculable. It was comprised […]
The firm of Raymond C. Yard of New York was one of the leading names in the 1920s and 1930s, catering to the elite of American high society, including the Rockefellers, Fleischmanns, Flaglers, and Woolworths. Yard’s career began in 1898 when, at the age of 13, he began working for the well-known New York firm […]
The journey from a dull piece of rough to the sparkling stone we know is a long process, with several stages, each carried out by a master. This blog will take you through the main steps, and hopefully illustrate the skill and talent of the diamond cutter. Planning The initial stage is simply to plan […]
One summer afternoon in 1891, Alexander Jacob, a gem dealer from Baghdad, entered the palace of the Nizam of Hyderabad, Prince Ali Pasha. He carried with him a 182 carat cushion-cut diamond, at that time called the Victoria Diamond. How it got into Jacob’s possession is not too clear a story. The Nizam was one […]
A new selection of diamond eternity rings have been uploaded to our website today (15th August). Most are in platinum, but many can also be made in yellow gold if desired. Though the idea of a diamond band was around for a long time, it was in the 20th century that they really came to […]
A very interesting gemstone that is not commonly seen is spinel, a red gemstone often confused with ruby. Indeed, until fairly recently all red gemstones were called rubies; however ruby is denser and slightly harder than spinel, (spinel is 8 on the Mohs scale) and the two can be easily differentiated by comparing refractive indices. […]