Gemstones,
Mother Natures Gift To Mankind

Mother Nature provides us with everything we need to survive, like food and water, but she also provides us with spectacular nature. Exotic and colorful animals, birds and insects and breath taking scenic surroundings. She also provides us with precious and semi-precious stones.
Besides being the most savage predator on the planet, we hunger for beautiful things that enhances us and our surroundings, and gems have fed that hunger for thousands of years. The quest to find valuable and precious minerals, has not been a pretty one. People have suffered and died in mining for precious gems for centuries. However they are, next to precious metals, the main ingredients in the jewelry industry.

Some gems are extraordinary and become famous due to their value, size or coloration, like the Hope Diamond and the Koh-i-noor diamond.

Precious and semi-precious stones have been used in jewelry making for as long back as the human race has existed. Today they are also highly treasured as collectors items in both raw and treated states.

They are mostly minerals, but certain rocks like Lapis Lazuli and organic materials, like Coral, amber or jet are also used in jewelry making. They were put in the semi-precious pot long before we had the technology to out rule them as other materials, so the label sticks to them, even today.
Gems come in all kinds of colors, patterns, shapes and prices. Some are enhanced and some are natural minerals. Some are even made in laboratories. Use them lavishly in your jewelry designs, and they will give your projects a hint of class that is hard to achieve with other types of beads.

Below you will find links to pages that hopefully will give you answers to all the questions you may have about precious and semi-precious jewelry stones.

Enjoy!

Gemstones A

Gems. B - I

Gems. J-M

Do you know how gems are classified. You can read about it here.

Gemstone Enhancements for better and for worse

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