The Very Highest Quality Alexandrite Information... |
Alexandrite |
Our photograph does not render the colour faithfully.
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Our photograph does not render the colour faithfully.
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Colour:
Chrysoberyl is mainly green, yellow or brown.
High quality alexandrite varies from grass green to raspberry red, although some stones will tend towards olive green or brown, and others to yellow. The red and green colouration is caused by the partial replacement of aluminium by chromium.
In daylight, stones appear green, whilst in tungsten lighting they will change colour to red. This effect is caused by a combination of factors. Alexandrite is bi-refringent (doubly refractive), and bi-axial, so that it possesses three different refractive indexes in its three different optical directions. Each of these three directions has a strongly different absorption spectrum, causing different colours to be seen when viewed from different directions in relation to the crystal structure, an effect known as pleochroism. Daylight contains high proportions of blue light, tungsten lighting contains a higher balance of red light. The two main optical directions of alexandrite absorb light of different wavelengths in considerably different ways. If this sounds technical and complicated, it is because it is technical and complicated. I will try to return to this paragraph later when I have worked out a simpler sounding way to explain the phenomenon. Any suggestions welcome.
Simulants
If I received £1 for every person that told me they have an alexandrite (always real, genuine and bought as such), and I gave £100 to everyone who really had, then I would be showing a very healthy profit. There have been many simulated alexandrites produced, usually made of synthetic corundum, occasionally synthetic spinel. A Japanese company also markets a synthetic alexandrite. Many of the simulants are quite large, 10 to 20mm , and are often set in 9ct gold dress rings. If real they would weigh about 5 to 10 carats each, and would be worth between about £5,000 to £20,000. As dress rings they were probably sold at under £100. Strangely enough, I believe that when they were originally sold, most of them were probably described by the jeweller as alexandrites. Hopefully this would not happen nowadays.
Chemical Composition and Name | BeAl2O4 - Beryllium Aluminium Oxide |
Hardness | 8.5 |
Refractive Index | 1.753 - 1.759 |
Bi-refringence | 0.008 - 0.010 |
Specific Gravity | 3.71 - 3.72 |
Crystalline System | Rhombic |
Pricing
Ten years ago, we could have supplied good quality alexandrites at about £1000 to £2000 per carat. Today you would expect to pay about five times those prices, due to high international demand, particularly from the Far East.
2005 Update
In the past few years, significant quantities of lower grade alexandrite has come on the market, mainly from Russia. Most of it is green with no apparent colour change, or if their is any colour change, it is extremely difficult to see. These are being marketed mainly by television jewellery shopping channels. We have now seen at least two samples which people have bought, and we were rather under-impressed. Both were in thin lightweight mounts, and even though they were in 18 carat gold, they looked as though they had been made "down to a price" like much of the jewellery from mass market discount multiples such as Argos of H. Samuel. This type of jewellery is alright as long as you stick to buying it because you like it, but it usually seems to be marketed along with ridiculous "valuation" prices or "starting" prices, then sold at about 10% of this figure.
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