When looking to buy sapphire rings it is helpful and interesting to know the origins of a sapphire. You may have already purchased your new sapphire ring and are gazing at its beauty.
Sapphires have both natural and manufactured origins. They have a wide range of uses not just as exquisite gems found in sapphire rings, broaches, earrings, necklaces and many other jewelry pieces, but as optical components used in electronics.
Interestingly sapphire can also be used to make watch faces in expensive watches as the durability of the material make it very difficult to scratch or crack the surface.
Sapphire is not the hardest substance known to man so it is still possible to damage the surface if contact is made with diamond or silicone carbide.
Sapphire can also be made into high quality windows due to the strength.
Sapphire is manufactured in large crystal boules. Naturally the sapphire we get in sapphire rings is a single crystal form of aluminium oxide which is a mineral recognized as corundum. We commonly consider a sapphire to be a blue colour. When small amounts of iron and chromium are found it gives a sapphire its colour.
Sapphires come in a variety of colours dependant on the amount of iron and chromium inclusion together with certain other mineral types. Pink, purple, orange, green, yellow and red sapphires can be found, all of which can be polished to make sapphire rings. It takes true craftsmanship to cut the stone to ensure the vibrancy of the colour is realised. A poor cut gem will produce a dull appearance and a blue colour, which is too dark.
Sapphires are found in exotic locations such as Thailand, India, Ceylon, Burma Vietnam, Brazil, Australia and Africa.
Fancy sapphires are considered to be any other shade of colour other than blue or red. Pink sapphires have traces of chromium, the darker the colour the higher the value. Yellow and green sapphires have traces of iron and purple sapphires have traces of the element vanadium.
You may have noticed that some sapphire rings have the ability to change colour in different light. They can often have a blue colour in outdoor light but then shift their colour to a purple when in indoor light.
Natural sapphires are normally baked for several hours at very high temperatures to improve their colour which quite often is a greyish brown to begin with.
Some sapphire rings have a star like shape which is known as an asterism. These exceptional and beautiful sapphire rings are formed from the mineral rutile that gives the appearance of a six pointed star, when viewed from above.
The clearer the colour of the stone and visibility and brightness of the star would generally reflect in the sapphire rings overall value.
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