GRADING REPORT PPES388
- Identification: Natural Pair Emeralds
- Carat: 3.88
- Shape: Drop
- Measures: 10.15x7.50x4.10 & 10.57x6.95x4.43 (millimeter)
- Color Grade: Excellent
- Tone: Medium Dark 70
- Color Zoning: None
- Clarity: Lightly Included (see comment)
- Cutting Grade: Very Good
- Brilliancy: 33%
- Depth: 54/63%
- Origin: Sandawana, Zimbabwe
- Treatment: Minor Oil only
Certificate No: IGI 208615039 & DSEF 081063
Overall Grade: Very Good++ (two + for twice the match)
Comment: Newly permitted into our stock: Oiled emeralds. (Please read here if you want to know why.)
This offer combines 1.96 and 1.92 as a pair of almost four carats. As mentioned here and there, and whenever possible, Sandawanas are, with sizes going up, rarer than 99% of all other gemstones. Although 1% clubs have gotten a bad image lately, or perhaps always have had, only you risked your neck for complaining about it, these here are but innocent gemstones, done nobody harm on their way to exclusivity. Also, in this small club are many that would not qualify as gems in terms of jewelry for various reasons, from brittleness, to boring rocks with no particular attractiveness except for the scientist. Of course, even a highly sensible, opaque grey piece of rock lacking luster or color but rare chemical properties that have been found only four times ever, will demand a collectors mark-up (if not for a pendant but a fire proof cupbord). Should a miner strike a ton of such un-attractive material, the value of the other four will decrease dramatically, unless the miner is of the very clever type and sells only one piece per year and on different continents. Yet, sooner or later the price will drop. Rare gems that are durable AND pretty at the same time, can be counted on ten fingers. Think 'red beryl' (within the emerald family), or some 'colored diamonds' (think violet, blue, and red, forget white), or 'benitoite' or 'taaffeite' and then we come to rare gems that also need extraordinary quality to be counted as particularly valuable. We know there is a lot of emerald, ruby or opal laying around but only a very small part of these qualify as gemstones at all, and of these only a tiny percentage could be be considered a worldclass rarity. Emeralds have that extreme tendency to be unique, each single gem is an individual. Finding a matching pair of shining Sandawana emeralds in record size and color-match is good luck, especially when you can afford them. The cheekbones below are pure luck, what lays in between, and what somebody does with it is written in a different language.
Read about Sandawana Emeralds, and here is a bit more about Emerald grading by the GIA.
This article from Guebelin reports the biggest cut Sandawana emerald as 1.56ct.
Even Brad must have had luck (and lots of $$$, both of which he has) to get these two Sandawanas in one go!
(If he didn't he surely paid way over $40k)
