Tanzanite Gems, Choosing Loose Tanzanite Gemstones

You will come across hundreds of gem providers offering loose tanzanite stones, and yet you will find very little useful information to help you choose the right loose tanzanite gem. We will try to cover the main factors that should guide you to select the right tanzanite gemstone. The information is not relevant only to loose tanzanite gemstones offered by Directstones and Kaisilver. It is general information that will guide you no matter where you buy your tanzanite stones from. Most gems including diamonds are mined in many parts of the world, there is something unique about tanzanite. This is one of the very few gemstones that is mined in just one location on our planet. As the name suggests, Tanzanite is found only in Tanzania. Keeping this fact in perspective it could be said that, Tanzanite is rarer than a diamond. We ofcourse do not go with the belief that this gemstone will cease to exist within the next few decades. This irrespective of what the big television sales channels and advertising gimmicks claim.

Do not expect all the tanzanite loose gems that you come across to be as gorgeous as the TNZ001. This gemstone is found in various grades and color saturation. The cushion tanzanite gemstone shown above is an eye clean stone with a AAA color. It might surprise you to note that almost 98% of the rough tanzanite gemstone that is brought out of the mines looks nothing like the stone in the image! Rough tanzanite has a murky greenish-brown appearance. A heat process is applied to rough tanzanite to bring out the color and clarity of the gemstone.

Choosing loose tanzanite gems needs to balance an equation between, gem size, color, clarity and ofcourse budget. Tanzanite like most other gems is priced per carat (weight unit), pieces of the same quality but bigger size are priced higher per carat. As an example, if you needed a tanzanite gem stone ring that had 6 pieces of 5mm round tanzanite gems, the gem cost component would be moderate even with AAA color and eye clean quality. The 6 pieces of 5mm round tanzanite stones would together add up to a weight of around 3 carats.

Contrast the price for a single loose tanzanite gem that was 3 carats in size. The same AAA color and eye clean quality would carry a premium price tag that is more than double (per carat) as compared to what you paid for the 6 pieces of 5mm round tanzanite. Read these paragraphs related to gem size and pricing over and over again until, you are sure that you understand the content. This is valuable input for the design of the tanzanite jewel that you will be selecting too. For example, you could not pick the design of a 5 carat mens blue topaz ring and request for the gem to be replaced with a high quality tanzanite. Technically this would not be an issue but very few budgets could handle such extravagance.

Let us now talk about the color of tanzanite gemstones. The color range of loose tanzanite stones can be grouped into three broad categories. The first is a very light and pale color tanzanite, this is generally used to produce low quality wholesale tanzanite jewelry. It also has demand when making sterling silver tanzanite jewels. At Direcstones we do not deal with such low quality tanzanite stones. The TNZ004 trillion cut tanzanite gem stone has a AA to AAA color like all the other tanzanite stones that we custom cut.

The next color shade of tanzanite is the medium color stone, this would go up to the AA color range and is what most good quality tanzanite jewelry is made from. This color shade strikes a good balance between color and price point. We would recommend this color tanzanite or better for all your tanzanite jewelry requirements.

The next color shade for loose tanzanite stones would be the darker color, this falls in the AAA color group. The gem images shown on this page are of the AAA color range. In normal circumstances, tanzanite with this color would be fairly expensive but, the right sourcing strategy at Directstones let you get these gems at a more modest price.

From color we move on to the clarity factor for loose tanzanite gemstones. For most natural gemstones a clarity that is rated 'eye clean' is a good rating. What this means is that when seen with the naked eye, you will not find any inclusions or cracks in the gemstone. Unless you are taking about loose tanzanite stones that are more than 4 to 5 carats in size, expecting an eye clean gemstone is very reasonable. If you plan to buy a loose tanzanite gem and have a jewel made, keep in mind that surface cracks can be a problem for the jeweler during the gem setting process. Of academic interest to most buyers is the term 'loupe clean' clarity. Gemstones are sometimes inspected with a magnifying glass, called a loupe. This device normally does a magnification of 10 and is referred to as a 10x loupe. It is quite possible that inclusions and flaws that are not visible to the naked eye, show up under the 10x loupe inspection. There is no reason why you should pay more money to shift from an eye clean gem to a loupe clean stone, so fix your standard at eye clean at least for tanzanite.

The TNZ005 is another loose tanzanite gem stone from Directstones. Once again an eye clean tanzanite with a color grading in the AA to AAA range. It is not easy to find such fine tanzanite gems in the gem retailing sources, they are generally picked up by highend jewelry producers like Kaisilver. However, the Directstones online gem resource which is managed by Kaisilver has made a commitment to make such gems available even to the smallest gem buyer. You can therefore order one single piece or as many as you need. Each gem is custom cut with rough procured directly from Tanzania.

There is another gem stone which can sometimes imitiate the color of tanzanite and this is iolite. Both tanzanite and iolite are natural gems, but they are not the same. It is often believed that it was only the media blitz conducted by Tiffany's that brought tanzanite gems into the limelight and showed positively on the prices that the gem could demand.

Finally a small warning about imitations and factory made fakes that are often sold as tanzanite. Beware of names like lab tanzanite, cz tanzanite, synthetic tanzanite etc. These are cheap material produced in factories and have nothing to with natural tanzanite that we have discussed in this report.

Directstones custom cuts all gems in your choice of shapes and sizes. You can pick just the loose gems or request for a complete custom made jewel to be made. All jewelry is produced in gold or sterling silver. The support team at sales@kaisilver.com will be glad to receive your questions and queries. The team is geared to educate rather than to sell, so do not hesitate to contact them for any information that you might need.