JEWELS, COAL, & GLUE AT THE MET MUSEUM Jewelry: The Body Transformed at The Metropolitan Museum has many royal gems even if it didn’t snag Marie Antoinette’s pearl and diamond pendant at Sotheby’s. Instead, the exhibition brings together innovative adornments from a range of centuries and cultures. An 1890s Tiffany Orchid brooch 4 ½” long combines an orchid’s delicacy with the glow of gold and diamonds. A bronze Celtic Northern Italy brooch from 600 B.C. is austere and elegant. It may be a model for a 1994 William Harper brooch Homage to Cy Twombly and Joseph Cornell. Both circular forms…
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Arguably the most delicious color range in the gemstone world, Kunzite is the cotton candy colored variety of the mineral spodumene. Delicate pastel pink to intense violet-ish purple, Kunzite is loved for the special hues available making it possible for designers to create impressive designs. In fact the Smithsonian Institution has a prized faceted heart-shaped kunzite that weighs a stunning 880 carats. Due to its pleochroic characteristic, meaning that it flashes two different shades of visible color, it shows the best color when you look down the length of the crystal. The pegmatite deposits that the rough kunzite crystals are…