Color me excited. It’s no secret that gemstones are my favorite jewelry category and have been since 2001, when I attended my first Tucson gem week. I was charmed by the vast, diverse, downright strange selection of stones on display, to say nothing of the roguish mix of characters who descend on the Arizona desert…

Add tanzanite, Ethiopian emeralds, and bicolor sapphires to your gem week shopping list Purple Reign Since it was discovered in 1968 in the Merelani region of Tanzania, in the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro, tanzanite has been something of a shape-shifter in the marketplace. Introduced to the world by Tiffany & Co., which christened the stone,…

Jewelry designers, gem dealers, and longtime showgoers tell us how to do Tucson right 1. Stay Focused Set a budget, work from a shopping list, and stick to it as best you can. “Jumping in headfirst on trending stones can be risky,” notes Rachel Chalchinsky, executive vice president of Color Source Gems, a New York…

Green, please! Everyone from Hollywood’s A-list to British royalty is obsessed with emeralds. Hey, we can’t blame them! Ever since Angelina Jolie swanned onto the red carpet at the Oscars in 2009 in 115 ct. Lorraine Schwartz emerald earrings (worth a reported $2.5 million), ­Hollywood has had a love affair with the green gem. But it’s…