It's Still Rock 'n' Rubies to Me

My friend Maggie and I began our adventures at the Tucson Gem Fair with a morning seminar on Thursday called, "Best Buys in Tucson," presented by Richard Drucker from GemWorld International.  He discussed issues facing colored gemstone dealers, which gemstones are most popular (and most expensive), the quality and sizes available, and to prepare ourselves for higher prices.


Then we hit the AGTA show.  Oh. My. Goodness.  I have never seen so many exquisite stones in one place.   We saw diamonds, emeralds, sapphires, rubies, aquamarine, opals, peridot, spinel, tourmaline, chrysoprase, garnet, chalcedony, pearls, morganite, moonstone, kunzite, tanzanite, topaz, citrine and more.   Expensive? Very!

One of the highlights of our day at AGTA was spending a little time with the famous Bernd Munsteiner and his son, Tom.  Bernd Munsteiner is one of the greatest gem carvers ever.  Tom has carried on the family tradition and his wife,  Jutta, is a master goldsmith who designs all of their jewelry pieces.   Maggie and I tried on a couple of their bracelets, which were eye-popping gorgeous.   Bernd even let us take pictures with him.  : )

On the second day we shopped the GJX.   Again, we found prices higher than we had expected and simliar to AGTA, but with more vendors from outside the country.


Third day: Holidome.   What a difference.  It felt like a gigantic flea market.  The pearls dropped from thousands of dollars a strand to two dollars a strand.  Certain items were of a lesser quality, but by doing some searching, we were able to find some nice stones for  excellent prices.  This is where I found some very unusual cabachons in peruvian opal and sugalite, which completely made my day.


What else did we do in Tucson?  Ate lots and lots of Mexican food!  Here is a photo of a unique entrance to one of the restaurants we tried.

We never even made it to any of the outdoor shows.  Maybe next year?

Blues, Greens and In Betweens

After receiving about a quart of Liver of Sulphur from Rio Grande, I've gone a little crazy with it. I'm throwing pieces of jewelry into the pot that I had never considered putting a patina on. It's always a surprise to see the results after a dip or two in the heated Liver of Sulphur, followed by a little steel wool scrub. This new pendant was made from one of the Australian Opals I bought in class a couple of weeks ago. The slightly antique look of the silver really brings out the blue of the stone, another unexpected effect.



Below is an example of my attempt to use some of those new skills I learned in the gemstone-setting workshop that took place a few months ago. : ) Practice, practice, practice.



This is Rebecca, the senior student I've been "mentoring" and teaching metalsmithing skills to. She made a lovely Egyptian spiral bracelet and just finished the pendant hanging from her neck. The picture is wacky because the camera was accidentally set on "Manual" by mistake. Whoops!



Here we have a couple photos from our trip to the Georgia Aquarium last week. Ken and Sharon, friends from Michigan, were in town and we acted like tourists with them for a couple of days.





The beginnings of my next project...such pretty stones...what shall I do with them?

Ball of Confusion

This past weekend I took a class on Granulation. Getting those tiny, little spheres to fuse to the silver without melting is not an easy task. There's no random torching here! What you see below is an experiment. The spheres did adhere, but I somehow over-cooked the silver so it now has a mottled appearance. I need to find out what I'm doing wrong here because it happened on both pieces. In November I'll be taking another workshop with the lovely Jean Stark, and will have to be proficient at this by then because I'll be using gold ($835 an ounce today). Overheating will not be an option. But I've been told that if you can fuse silver, gold will be easy. I'm counting on this to be true. :) 

Somewhere in Atlanta with Diamonds

On Thursday afternoon I finished a three-day workshop with Robert Wooding where I learned how to set gemstones. Being the novices we all were, we used brass rings and cubic zirconias to do our experimenting with, and were expected to set approximately 3 to 4 rings every day. I learned far more than I expected to and am thrilled I took the course and can now, actually, set a stone! Amazing! Cabachons are cool and all, but sometimes its exciting to add something more...something dazzling.

Since returning home, I've been stuck with my head in the Stuller catalog, the Fire Mountain Gems catalog, and the Rio Grande Catalog, trying to find some lovely gemstones. Hmmmm...far too many choices!

Here's a good video on Youtube that demonstrates how to set a stone, for anyone interested:

http://www.technorati.com/videos/youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DpDiLpLgBOC4

I'd like to find a good source for gems in the near future. If anyone reading this has a suggestion, shoot me an email (Kathygrz@mac.com) or leave a message below. It would be very much appreciated! : )