Jewellery specialist, Geoffrey Munn and V&A metals conservator and gemmologist, Joanna Whalley examine and discuss a stunning 1920s Cartier brooch with an enormous emerald centrepiece of just under 40 carats.
That brooch is now for sale in christie's and has an estimate of 500 to 700 thousand usd. UPDATE: the brooch is sold for $1,545,000 ( including buyers premium and fees )
Funkenstein You are blind and rather vulgar. That emerald is a very bluish green. A stormy deep ocean green. Not a typical emerald green that we often see with its namesake stone.
That center stone is astonishing. Modern mines and gemcutters would have reduced that stone into fragments with possibly a 5 carat centerpiece. The inclusions are beautiful, because you can see the stone was a real mineral out of the earth.
@@gloriahanes6490 I like flawless gems more. Natural ones are nice, but I think lab grown are just as good. In most cases, people would prefer flawless gems, I think. Emerald just happens to be one of the ones where it's extremely rare to find a flawless one.
rosewatersaffron I completely agree with your comment and the reply by Hypatia4242. I told my husband, when he asked for ideas for rings, I told him vintage art deco style, old school, something one-of-a-kind, no diamonds or very little diamonds, perfectly imperfect (since I dont tend to notice basic clarity anyway) and something that peaked his interest and reminded him of me and I wound up getting this vintage art deco, 1950s ring with a handset brownish jade cloud colored emerald with Caribbean ocean colored triangled sapphires on each side set in a gold that was slightly tarished brass colored and filigree along the sides. I was more stunned by the ring than the proposal. It was so... I'm perfectly imperfect and the cutest part was how he said the emerald reminded him of my eyes which they are hazel with brown along the edges hehehe
Im just in awed. The inclusions on natural emeralds are called Jardins. French for gardens. On natural emeralds its expected. Extremely rare to find flawless emeralds in nature without "jardins". One can always tell from lab to nature made emeralds. Lab created emeralds are flawless almost green glass like and no Jardins. But chemically they are both the same both natural and lab created. Except in nature and during the hard conditions nature is unable to filter out the jardins. Me personally i love the glow of natural emeralds and love the perfection of lab created emeralds. I can do without the jardins. Hey but some like that lol. As far as the brooch it's stunning a true work of art. Collecting those sapphires alone shows the dedication and commitment to getting all the stones to be of the same color. The attention to detail and craftsmanship exceptional and terrific :) Viva the jewelery house of Cartier :)
I have an emerald ring that I inherited from my grandmother, and while it's very good quality there are some jardins in it, and I simply adore them. They make the light play in such a lovely way.
That's an emerald which is probably nearly irreplaceable these days. I want to correct the gentleman about the piercings. A small hole is drilled into the area to be pierced, a jewelers saw blade is inserted and the blade is tightened up in the frame. The piercing commences, and then, possibly, some touch up with a file. These piercings are not done with a file alone.
'Limpid' is right. Somehow, the emerald reminds me of my grandparents listening to Pink Floyd's 'Ummagumma'. Both come close to inducing a trance-like state.
Would you walk around with something 1.5 million dollars pinned to your shirt or hair? My faith and trust in my fellow man is obviously much less than yours. Lol.
It's actually not for everyday wear. I agree though people should be fine with adornment such as more often. Just as well most would look at someone sporting something like this as if it was costume jewelry.
lol that wouldn't even pay for the sapphires those are for sure Kashmir valley sapphire's (sugar loaf is just the style of cut) which haven't been mined for over a 110 years and fetches anywhere from 20-30 thousand a carat in its top royal blue colour with top clarity so guess again (5 carats = 1 gram)
Beautiful thing, love Geoffrey, but frustratingly average camera work; what is up with the inability to focus on the right element and eliminate reflection etc? Everyone's a photographer now and yet nobody is. Learn the basics, people.
