A Step By Step Guide on Birthstone Jewelry
Wearing birthstone jewelry is based on the same idea. Not only does it make you feel relaxed and calm, it also works as a good luck charm. Your birthstone is believed to be the ultimate lucky charm. For centuries, people have used gemstones forever.
Birthstones have been around for so long that you would think the list of gemstones is fixed. That’s wrong. Although the term dates back to biblical times, this list was just updated two years before him. The National Jewelers Association, now known as the Jewelers of America, laid the foundation for the Modern American List in 1912.
She tried to rank the gemstones associated with specific months over time. One might think the list would be complete after this tipping point, but it’s not. In 2016, Jewelers of America added spinel to the August birthstone list. Find your birthstone below, discover how unique you are, and learn interesting facts about your birthstone!
January — Garnet
February — Amethyst
March — Aquamarine
April — Diamond
May — Emerald
June — Alexandrite
July — Ruby
August — Peridot
September — Sapphire
October — Opal
November — Citrine
December — Zircon
1. January Birthstone — Garnet (passionate, courageous, confident)
Garnet refers to an assemblage of minerals with a common crystal form but slightly different chemical compositions, resulting in gemstones of almost any shade. Red garnets are the best known, but gem buyers and collectors can choose from a wide range of garnet hues, including greens, oranges, pinkish oranges, fuchsias, and even blues. February — Amethyst (intelligent and sincere)
2. February Birthstone — Amethyst (intelligent and sincere)
Amethyst's violet hues range from gentle lilac to deep, rich royal violet, and brownish to light. The best shade is a rich reddish purple to deep purple, as long as the stone is not too dark to dull the light. Amethyst can be cut into many typical shapes and patterns. Amethyst is also a popular stone for various free-form carvings. This is done manually or using an automatic cutting machine. These fantasy or designer cuts can be mass produced or made as one off pieces.
3. March Birthstone Aquamarine (brilliance, resilience, bewitching)
Aquamarine’s color spectrum is relatively limited, consisting primarily of shades of blue or patina. A diamond’s most expensive hue is a relatively intense dark blue to slightly greenish blue. In general, the purer and brighter the blue hue, the more expensive the stone. The gem’s hardness and clarity make it attractive to designers, painters, and sculptors.
4. April Birthstone diamond (calm and individual)
Diamonds vary in color from clear to slightly yellowish. A diamond’s cut can either increase or decrease its value by highlighting the diamond’s natural inclusions and shape. Cut is unique to a diamond’s symmetry and cut. A high quality cut therefore makes the diamond stand out more.
5. May Birthstone — Emerald (calms the mind and enriches the imagination)
The brightness of its hue makes emerald a unique gemstone. Emeralds, on the other hand, almost always contain some kind of inclusion. These cracks, microscopic crystals, and even bubbles often affect the color uniformity of a gemstone. Even if there are minute inclusions, it does not detract from its high value. Even with inclusions, a rich, bright green emerald is far more valuable than a softer, near-perfect emerald. Emerald is the best-known member of the beryl family, which also includes aquamarine, morganite, and other lesser-known gems. The presence of chromium or vanadium gives the emerald green color.
6. June Birthstone — Alexandrite (determination and strength)
A good alexandrite has a medium tone and rich hue, changing from blue-green in daylight to ruby red or deep red in incandescent or candlelight. Some alexandrite's are less desirable because they lose their color and both shades are visible at the same time. In any case, this kind of thing happens quite often, because the light sources are often mixed with each other. Brownish and gray tones are common in alexandrite, but their presence detracts from the stone’s appeal and value.
7. July Birthstone — Ruby (passionate and clever)
Ruby is a type of corundum mineral, just like sapphire. Ruby is the most expensive form of corundum and has the highest price per carat of any colored stone, making it one of the most important gems in the colored stone market. The finest corundum is colorless, but traces of chromium give ruby its orange-red to crimson red hue. The amount of chromium present directly affects the intensity of a ruby’s red color. The more chrome, the deeper the red hue. If chromium fluoresces, the intensity can also be increased.
8. August Birthstone— Peridot (friendly and happy)
Peridot is one of the few gemstones that has only one color, green. Colors range from olive green to golden green. The most valuable peridot is rich in iron and has a deep green color with no hints of brown or yellow. These high-grade stones, which can weigh over 10 carats, come from Myanmar and Pakistan. Virtually all peridot gemstones on the market today are close to yellow-green in color. Peridot rough is widely available and can be worked into a variety of shapes and cutting styles. Designers offer different versions of the basic cut and develop mixed cuts, beads and engravings alongside traditional gem shapes in the jewelry industry. September — Sapphire (peaceful and innocent)
9. September Birthstone— Sapphire (peaceful and innocent)
Sapphire is hard and durable, making it an ideal gemstone for everyday jewelry. Sapphires belong to the corundum family and most people associate this gem with blue, but sapphires come in many different colors. Fancy sapphire comes in pink, purple, violet, green, yellow, orange, and colors in between. Some crystals have two
10. October Birthstone — Opal (lucky and all-purpose)
More than any other gemstone, opal has a wide variety of appearance and color options. Opal is such a special stone that it can look different from every angle. Opal dazzles with a spectacular display of flashing, dancing colors that move and change in the various layers of the stone. Opal has been described in many ways, from fireworks to rainbows. Under a powerful microscope, opal reveals the secret of the so-called play-of-color, an extraordinary display of all the colors of the rainbow. Opal is composed of many tightly stacked ultra-fine spheres, which gives it a play-of-color.
11. November Birthstone — Citrine (Optimistic)
Citrine’s hues range from bright yellow to gold to reddish brown. Reddish-brown citrine is commonly called Madeira citrine because its hue is very close to Madeira wine. In Bolivia, shades of amethyst and citrine can coexist in the same crystal, and these unique gemstones are called ametrine. Because citrine is made from quartz, the crystals that are heat treated to produce citrine come in many shapes and sizes. There are many large gemstones up to 20 carats, but the price per carat of citrine does not skyrocket even in such large quantities.
12. December Birthstone — Zircon (charming and gentle)
Zircon is used to process the optical properties of high refractive index materials. Also, birefringence is an optical phenomenon that occurs in some minerals when a single ray of light hits the gemstone and is split into two independent rays. Due to these two properties, it is a very popular stone that emits a lot of multicolored light called “fire” and gives it a unique shine to those who see it. In fact, the two gemstones have been often confused for thousands of years because zircon treats light so much like diamond.