Wishing everyone the very best for the New Year 🎉 When I heard the Pantone Colours for the year 2021 were the rock solid ‘Ultimate’ gray and the cheerful, ‘Illuminating’ yellow – The first gemstone that came to mind was the Sinhalite.  

Sinhalite was first identified in Srilanka in 1952. Prior to that year it was considered to be a variety of Peridot! 

The mineral was named Sinhalite after the Sanskrit name ‘Sinhala’ by which Srilanka was known. 

It’s said to be a gemstone that represents ‘joy in the everyday life’ and encourages one to step into new beginnings … 

With those thoughts, I wish you all an abundant year 🥂x

Another imposter:)  A Hydrothermal Synthetic Emerald. It shows the parallel, slightly wavy and angular growth pattern. A very obvious clue to its origin!

My first stop this holiday was to the Dubai Museum. Dubai is such a welcoming and friendly corner of the Middle East, I was eager to get to know it better. Our room overlooked the creek, where Dubai ‘grew up’ around. The ancient Greeks used to call it the ‘River Zara’. The different colored boats and ships on the calm waters took my breath away every morning.

The impressive 18^th century Al Fahidi Fort houses the Dubai Museum. When we first set our eyes on (more…)

When I look at this quartz I imagine autumn and leaves blowing in the breeze…  It also looks like golden yellow straw:) !!!

Ok so this is an inner view of yet another quartz, rutilated quartz. The reddish brown to black (more…)

How majestic is the Hope Pearl?!  And what character! This natural freshwater pearl, baroque in shape weighs 450 ct (1800 grains). It’s one of the largest pearls in the world…

Its measurements are said to be 2 inches in length, the broadest circumference is four and a half inches and the narrowest three and a quarter inches.

The colour at the base is a dark green copper tint, gradually fading upwards to a white lustre.

As you can see, this princely beauty is capped with a crown of red enamelled gold, decorated with diamonds, rubies and emeralds. How wonderful!

The Hope pearl is named after its owner, Henry Philip Hope, the passionate gem collector. He was (more…)

A Happy 2016, every body!!! May it bring an abundance of  good things to all!

Here I am kicking off with the first post of the year, celebrating the biggest gem news that broke out around New Years Day in Sri Lanka … The Star of Adam.

(more…)

Flask like bubble with a tail…

We all need clues like this one to immediately spot an impostor, a fake…

Sapphires and Rubies are from the Corundum family. The inclusion above was seen within a  (more…)

What happened to playful moments? Playful thinking and ‘silly’ moments? Have we become so grown up, and oh-so- serious and too responsible to leave room in the day for a bit of play?

These were the questions I was asking myself this morning. A peaceful morning which offered me a (more…)

The family of Quartz has fascinating inclusions to look at. You are looking at an internal view of a colourless quartz.

The colourless variety is known as Rock Crystal and this particular gemstone is known as Strawberry Quartz due to the colour of the inclusions. Red and black, in needle form and platy, they are sometimes referred to as   ‘beetle

(more…)

Who doesn’t love the ‘jewel of the sea’! But at what cost in early times!!!

I bought this vintage photograph after being told they were pearl divers and it was called ‘Arab divers’.

This image of the men with clips on their noses is disturbing, don’t you think?! It aroused my (more…)