What is Your Job?

The Red Emerald has no voice, but my job is to try and serve in that capacity.

If this gem could speak, what would the stone say? I believe the name it would use to introduce itself is Red Emerald.

The manner by which the green emerald presents itself in this world is the same expressed essence of the red. One cannot have a knowledge and appreciation of the Red Emerald without a knowledge and appreciation of the green. One who knows nothing about Emeralds should not be intimidated, because when I first heard about this New Precious Gemstone Variety less than four years ago, I knew nothing about gemstones.

I never cared about gemstones, and many of my peers still feel this way. Until diamonds came to dominate the industry some 150 years ago, Emeralds and Rubies were the most revered stones in the world.

Emeralds contain nature's finest works of art. Their study is like evaluating tiny frozen galaxies, their admiration is reminiscent of searching for figures in clouds and their possession is like owning a sunset. I was amazed by the discovery of a new variety in this species, and I found myself scientifically fascinated. Even as an industry outsider, I knew a New Precious Gemstone Variety in the same species as Emerald was not the kind of discovery which could go unnoticed.

As one of the most uncommon minerals discovered, I could wrap my head around the figures involved with the world's finite red beryl supply, and I wanted to examine all of it. I cashed out my savings, leveraged the equity in the business I shared with my parents and sold the comic collection I curated since childhood. The monetary liquidity financed my new mineral hobby, which focused exclusively on this New Precious Gemstone Variety - the Red Emerald. I amassed as many carats as anyone ever has.

Separating Facet-Grade Red Beryl Rough

Material on the secondary market was cheaper than the cost of mining, which clearly illustrates why no industrial operation has ever been financially successful! I continued acquisitions until I obtained a scientifically-relevant percentage of the world supply. All red beryl currently above-ground is 2.5% to 5% of everything that exists on Earth. I gathered between 2.5% and 5% of all faceted Red Emerald stones produced thus far. This seemed like more success than 1% of the 1%, but I am not a statistician, and all my work with numbers suffers from this critical flaw.

While overall volume may seem meager as a single-digit percentage, what my holdings represent would require many years of traditional mining to produce, and I focused my efforts on obtaining outstanding examples. While perhaps a low proportion of total supply, my collection was pruned to be a high percentage of the best material. Many pinnacle pieces for the hardest to find gem species on this planet are in our inventory.

With Dad in Juab County, Utah by the world's only deposit of Tiffany Stone - opalized fluorite with a dark purple color similar to Wah-Wah Cabochons.

Though I had a significant portion of an entire mineral variety, I never pulled a single carat from the ground myself. In this arena of knowledge I was woefully deficient, so I began rockhounding as a form of real-world mineral training. I sifted through rhyolite dust to find red beryl wafers in the Cove at Wildhorse Springs on the Thomas Range in Utah. I contacted descendants of the former mine owners and accepted their invitation to visit the Ruby Violet claims. I have observed the Emerald in her natural habitat!

I dug the Topaz Apex on my first outing to the Cove.

A heart-shaped red beryl twin on the termination face of a Topaz crystal.

I dedicated every waking day of the last forty seven months to the study of this mineral. I abandoned responsibility to follow a free and independent pursuit of the Red Emerald alone. Unfortunately, it does not take long for even the casual reader to consume all that is written, since only a few dozen articles have been composed on the subject. As a comic book collector, finding the "issues" where red beryl made an appearance in trade magazines and industry publications required a marginal effort. There is currently a black hole around red beryl where information is supposed to be, but we will fix this problem by providing more on this website than could fit in any book!

Kennecott paid over $10 million dollars to research the Red Emerald. I spent six figures for the material Kennecott produced, establishing a personal index with more information on this subject than any library. Nearly 100 work-hours were required to scan file cabinets filled with documentation that included laboratory analysis, actual production figures, industry research, scientific studies and more.

A number of lapidaries I worked with were initially opposed to the name Red Emerald only to be converted by the crimson crystal itself, which is shaped, responds and acts as emerald rough would; red and green do not behave on the cutting wheel as the other beryl varieties. Robert Weldon, a graduate gemologist of some repute, penned an article in 1999 titled The Case for Red Emerald. Ray Zajicek is quoted therein as saying, "I have sawed and preformed it. I have cut, polished and immersed it in a colorless medium. This is an emerald, except it's red."

Ray's contribution to the Emerald far exceeds his personal facet production, and he once imported a large percentage of the United States Emerald supply. He is a founder and the third president of the American Gemological Trade Association. He is one of the leaders of the colored gemstone industry. If someone of this caliber makes such a clear statement, it stands to reason they may possibly be right.

I believe in the Red Emerald as many others do, but for a number of reasons, no one has been able to prove a Red Emerald exists until now. All Red Emerald fans deserve to have the reasons they can use to defend their belief against any skeptic, despite the fact this industry has never required justification for belief in any color corundum sold as a sapphire.

I can prove the Red Emerald is real, because a Red Emerald physically exists, and I will show it to you.

I scratched together bits of this impossibly scarce scarlet variety until I had enough to create fine jewelry using the very best of the world's rarest stones. Incomparable to any collection which has ever appeared on the market, I have included many pieces of mineralogical and gemological significance.

Our selection features some of the largest examples in three commercial gem species in the shortest stock: Not only Red Emerald, but also Benitoite and Pezzottaite. Each of these varieties will only ever produce a whisper of inventory, and every design is one-of-a-kind by dictate of supply.

I would not demand excellence of the highest standard for a stone which were less than what this is, something beneath a Red Emerald!

Misjudging the identity of a precious gemstone is an easily forgivable mistake. So little exists that no one had the opportunity to examine a sufficient selection where similarities in exceptional materials could be observed.

One must sort through thousands if not tens of thousands of carats to find an Emerald trapiche. Such a specimen is a rare form of one of the rarest gem species....it's double-rare! Every American relative to the Colombian Emerald is as double-rare as a trapiche.

My job is to consider these facts, and the Red Emerald still fills me with wonder whenever I do.

Even at 1/10th of a carat,

this red beryl poker chip specimen is no less triple-rare.