Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with gemstones

How old is this ring?

angry.polymath — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 11:27:04 -0800

Please help me get an idea how old this ring is, and what stone is in it. Among my grandmother's things was an old silver ring with an opaque blue stone in it.

It's clearly hand-made, and has some sort of sizing apparatus on the back. I've never seen anything quite like it.

I know nothing about gemstones or minerals or jewelry, so can anyone give me even a vague idea of when this kind of ring was in fashion, and what "style" it is? And also, what is the blue stone in it?

Pics are here, here, and here.

Thanks!

Gemstone scam?

PowerCat — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:01:30 -0800

A friend of mine has become involved in a new... "job" It sounds too good to be true so it must be! Basically, this "job" involves my friend receiving very specific money transfer requests from some dude he found on craigslist.

He gets a transfer, sometimes western union, sometimes an interac or email transfer, he then has to cash it and transer it to someone else. The guy usually wants this done within the next hour or so.

The guy explained that what he's doing is getting clients to buy gem stones over the internet or something, then he has to transfer it in my friend's name and then he has to collect the money and transfer it to some other person (A NIGERIAN!)

Is this some sort of money laundering scam? I really don't know what's up with whole deal and I'd like to know if there are ricks for him at all? My friend's name is on all these transfers...
Any info is appreciated.

Can you recommend places in San Francisco or online to buy interesting silver+gemstone jewelry?

otherwordlyglow — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 09:29:50 -0800

Can you recommend places in San Francisco or online to buy interesting silver+gemstone jewelry? I need a necklace (preferably with matching earrings) for a special occasion. I'm thinking that something silver with some color, maybe semi-precious gemstones in various colors, would be nice. Something feminine and somewhat delicate. Could be vintage, could be modern.

I've been looking around Etsy and found some that are close to what I'm looking for but none is exactly right and I find it really difficult to browse in any efficient manner on Etsy. Any other ideas?

If there's a place in San Francisco that I should check, I'd be open to that, too but my time is limited so online might be better.

Questions about Crystals

Large Marge — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 11:03:41 -0800

How do we know what makes up a gemstone? And did people know in the previous centuries when (I assume) these techniques weren't around I just finished reading The Blue Carbuncle, and in it Holmes says something to the effect of "all this fuss over a small piece of crystallized charcoal." I know that rubies are just doped sapphires, which is just crystal aluminum oxide, so my impression is that the boundary between the two might not be hard and set, yet there are all these gem stones and tons of different names and chemical compositions, so how do/did we determine what something was? How did Holmes know that diamond was carbon (although apparently he was wrong about the carbuncle, which is what got me wondering)?

Also, is there a good natural history book about all this?

shine on your crazy tourmaline (or whatever)

luriete — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 20:09:47 -0800

When I was a kid living in La Mesa, California, my mother got to poke around in the tailings at local tourmaline and mica mines as part of weekend classes we took at the natural history museum. Are there any kinds of similar gemstone mines anywhere near where I live now - Sacramento, California - that offer similar opportunities?

How can I sell a collection of gemstones?

wingless_angel — Fri, 30 May 2008 00:46:14 -0800

My husband inherited his late father's gemstone collection 6 years ago, and we want to know how to sell it. Thousands of rocks and stones are in the collection, some valuable, some not. Some are labelled, some not. Should we ask/pay for an appraiser to come to the house and take a look? Where would I find an appraiser? Can we sell them as a job lot? I'm worried about getting ripped off since we have no skills in this trade ourselves. How hard would it be to sell individual pieces on eBay? (We're in Australia).

This collection could potentially be a down payment on a house for us, so if we are going to sell it, we want to do it right.

Romantic symbolism: conflict-free and on the cheap

kyleg — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 19:32:18 -0800

Help me find a quality, non-diamond engagement ring that wont plunge me deeper into debt. My fiancee and I have been engaged for long enough that it's getting annoying and pretty ridiculous that she doesn't have a ring yet. We are both aware of the sins of the diamond industry, but she likes the look of diamonds or light-colored gemstones.

We've been to jewelers in person to find out what styles we like, but their prices range from too much to completely insane, and there's too much focus on the hard-sell of the diamond. Where can we go to find what we're looking for, either in Chicago, NE Indiana, or online?

What we're looking for: emerald-cut stone, plain or engraved white gold band, antique style, pave halo around the stone (without using diamonds, which is seemingly impossible). But nothing too fancy. Is a custom setting our best option? Is there any way to do this on a tight budget?

Movie Gemstones?

lalalana — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 20:54:56 -0800

I am compiling a list of large gemstones in movies. Anything to add to the following list? Emerald from Romancing the Stone/Jewel of the Nile
Heart of the Ocean from Titanic
Stone of the Snake Temple in Conan the Barbarian
Ceremonial stone from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
Diamond from Snatch

(Yeah, yeah, I may not have all the name correct in the current list. I'm not worrying about that level of detail at this stage, so no imdb call-outs... well, okay, you can call me out, but be nice.)

Where should I get my jewelry appraised?

littlegirlblue — Sun, 19 Dec 2004 16:32:34 -0800

Jewelry appraisal : I have a rather unique piece of jewelry that I'd like to get appraised to find out what the gemstone is, and possibly the origins of the piece. What kind of place should I go to? Any specific questions I should ask? What should an appraisal cost? Thanks in advance.