Seeing Red

Many of you already love colored gems but for those who are unfamiliar with Nature's gem bounty,  I introduce the Fire Opal. 

This gem material is mined primarily, but not exclusively in Mexico, giving it the name "Mexican " Fire Opal.  Unlike its cousin, the Australian opals with play of color, Mexican Fire Opals are solid chunks of color, ranging from warm golden yellows, to bright oranges, to the rarest color, the cherry red.

It's this latter color that has always thrilled me most because nowhere else in the gem world do you find such red. I'm lucky to do business with an opal company that gets premium material and cuts it in Germany, so each stone presents maximum radiance. 

All of the stones you see in the suite above (and more) were  combined into a ring and earrings for one of my color-loving clients. We bought the 4.7 carat center stone a couple of years ago and discussed many options for setting this important piece. Ring? Pendant? Ring? Pendant? Simple? Complex? Simple? 
We finally decided to keep the ring simple and celebrate Red. 

Next, came earrings.  We decided to go with smaller  opals so that the client could wear them with more of her other gold jewelry. The client chose the Daisy earrings on the far right. We customized them with fire opals (they appear on this website in the Metropolitan Section with tsavorite garnet.)