Distinction Jewelry – The Blog

They’re two different things, right?  Or are they?  Rubies and sapphires are actually color variations of the same mineral, corundum.   Corundum occurrs in a remarkably wide color spectrum including blues, pinks, reds, yellows, greens, blacks, whites, and every shade in between.  Traditionally, the red variety has been called ruby while all of the others were termed sapphires.

The waters get muddied when one looks at ruby colors, because rubies are commonly seen as a stone with a wide range of hues from true red to wine to pink.  The most hard-line interpretation tells us to call only true red corundum ruby, and all of the others pink sapphires.  This is a little problematic however because most people outside of the jewelry field think of many shades of dark pink corundum as ruby, and would never think to ask for a “dark pink sapphire.”

Jewelry stores have been marketing light, sparkly pinks as pink sapphire, dark pink to red shades as ruby, and when you see a true red ruby for less than a small fortune, it is likely to be corundum grown in a lab, as the true red is a rare and expensive shade of corundum.

At the bottom of all of this confusion lies one reassuring fact: it’s all basically the same stone.  Your main job is to pick the shade that makes you happy, and at the end of the day it really doesn’t matter if your jeweler called it a ruby or a pink sapphire.

Oh, and the ring in my post?  I listed it for sale as a ruby…..but pink sapphire would be just as accurate, if not more so.

Prices of stones tend to rise exponentially as their size increases.  This is because of two factors.  First, larger patches of gem-quality material that can be cut into a faceted stone are rarer than smaller ones, so for most stones there is a smaller supply of larger sizes.  For example, a .5 carat stone might cost 25.00 a carat, while a 1 carat gem of the same material might cost 100.00 a carat.

Second, the larger stone weighs more…and remember how much the price per carat just jumped?  These factors help explain why size can make a tremendous difference between an affordable stone and an out-of-reach one.

What’s a good compromise size on a budget?  I’m partial to 4mm.  Any smaller than that and it becomes difficult to truly make out the stone’s color and brilliance, but at 4mm they show up nicely.  Weight varies from stone to stone, but the weight of a 4mm stone is usually somewhere around .5 carat.  Many colored gemstones can be had in a 4mm size for anywhere between $10-40.00, and you can even get a decent ruby or sapphire for under or around $100.00.

In the 4mm range, your choice of gemstone often won’t make more than a $5-20.00 difference in the cost of your custom piece.

If you really want a precious stone on a tight budget, consider a 3mm ruby, emerald, or sapphire.  This is pretty tiny and won’t make for a flashy display…but if you have personal or sentimental reasons for wanting the stone, one can be yours for $25-40.00.

If you want a large stone at an affordable cost, don’t despair.  There are a number of very nice gems which are common enough and occur in large enough formations that your bling won’t cost you a month’s salary.  Taking an 8mm stone as an example, I can easily get my hands on nice amethyst, citrine, blue, pink, or white topaz, sometimes garnet and labradorite.