Tourmaline Falcon Sculpture
This was my very first trip after I founded L’AQUART, eleven years ago. I was visiting the Hong Kong Jewellery Fair and after the show was done I decided to see my friends from Blue Gems. We have been buying all sorts of gems from Mohammed Naseem for the past 30 years and developed a very nice friendship even though we just see each other once a year. I think you must have a very close connection with your gem supplier; there is a lot more than just business transactions, it’s the trust, the feeling, this special energy that gives you the confidence to acquire his gems.
Back to the story; I had no appointment, I just showed up Saturday at noon, I think both Mohamed and Shuja (his son) were about to leave their office but they were very nice and welcomed me to see their gems. Focal Industrial is a surrealistic area in Hong Kong; buildings that only have gemstone dealers of all sorts and tons and tons of gems from all over the World!
Immediately I put my eye on a beautiful Tanzanian Ruby lot, although I try to keep cool, it was hard not to open my eyes as an owl! So that was my first pick, around 350 kg of large beautiful colour ruby (it seems like a lot but Ruby is pretty heavy). I am a very curious person and gladly they allowed me to rummage through their entire warehouse; I was opening closed sacs, boxes, it was like Christmas! After few minutes of this mini gem hunt I found this enormous Tourmaline Crystals from Madagascar, never seen in my life! They were three thick slices belonging to a single crystal that had around 30 cm in diameter. The crystal was combed at the mine to try see their translucency, luckily the three “slices” were undamaged. They weighed 39,000 – 42,000 – 32500 carats respectively (OMG!) Together with that a super gemmy rubelite bag with small crystals that I practically took as hostage (since I saw in their faces they were not very keen into selling them).
I selected other stones as well and then we went into the office with a hand written list of my selection. So, we had some tea, I kindly asked them to give me their best price and discussed for a little bit, they wrote on the paper and I just saw a number so big I was not sure what to say. I asked again to please give me a good price and we all just kept quiet for around 20 minutes, not a single word; finally they wrote a new number and I was very happy to accept it. A hand shake and promise of payment on an agreed date was enough to close this deal (this is one of the things I love most about this business, deals are made old school, just a handshake and your word and we are talking of some serious numbers.
Eleven years after this little adventure, we finally decided to carve these babies into this statement Falcon sculpture. Its 44 cm in length from tip to tip of wings, to my understanding possibly the largest Tourmaline ever carved.
This was my very first trip after I founded L’AQUART, eleven years ago. I was visiting the Hong Kong Jewellery Fair and after the show was done I decided to see my friends from Blue Gems. We have been buying all sorts of gems from Mohammed Naseem for the past 30 years and developed a very nice friendship even though we just see each other once a year. I think you must have a very close connection with your gem supplier; there is a lot more than just business transactions, it’s the trust, the feeling, this special energy that gives you the confidence to acquire his gems.
Back to the story; I had no appointment, I just showed up Saturday at noon, I think both Mohamed and Shuja (his son) were about to leave their office but they were very nice and welcomed me to see their gems. Focal Industrial is a surrealistic area in Hong Kong; buildings that only have gemstone dealers of all sorts and tons and tons of gems from all over the World!
Immediately I put my eye on a beautiful Tanzanian Ruby lot, although I try to keep cool, it was hard not to open my eyes as an owl! So that was my first pick, around 350 kg of large beautiful colour ruby (it seems like a lot but Ruby is pretty heavy). I am a very curious person and gladly they allowed me to rummage through their entire warehouse; I was opening closed sacs, boxes, it was like Christmas! After few minutes of this mini gem hunt I found this enormous Tourmaline Crystals from Madagascar, never seen in my life! They were three thick slices belonging to a single crystal that had around 30 cm in diameter. The crystal was combed at the mine to try see their translucency, luckily the three “slices” were undamaged. They weighed 39,000 – 42,000 – 32500 carats respectively (OMG!) Together with that a super gemmy rubelite bag with small crystals that I practically took as hostage (since I saw in their faces they were not very keen into selling them).
I selected other stones as well and then we went into the office with a hand written list of my selection. So, we had some tea, I kindly asked them to give me their best price and discussed for a little bit, they wrote on the paper and I just saw a number so big I was not sure what to say. I asked again to please give me a good price and we all just kept quiet for around 20 minutes, not a single word; finally they wrote a new number and I was very happy to accept it. A hand shake and promise of payment on an agreed date was enough to close this deal (this is one of the things I love most about this business, deals are made old school, just a handshake and your word and we are talking of some serious numbers.
Eleven years after this little adventure, we finally decided to carve these babies into this statement Falcon sculpture. Its 44 cm in length from tip to tip of wings, to my understanding possibly the largest Tourmaline ever carved.
This was my very first trip after I founded L’AQUART, eleven years ago. I was visiting the Hong Kong Jewellery Fair and after the show was done I decided to see my friends from Blue Gems. We have been buying all sorts of gems from Mohammed Naseem for the past 30 years and developed a very nice friendship even though we just see each other once a year. I think you must have a very close connection with your gem supplier; there is a lot more than just business transactions, it’s the trust, the feeling, this special energy that gives you the confidence to acquire his gems.
Back to the story; I had no appointment, I just showed up Saturday at noon, I think both Mohamed and Shuja (his son) were about to leave their office but they were very nice and welcomed me to see their gems. Focal Industrial is a surrealistic area in Hong Kong; buildings that only have gemstone dealers of all sorts and tons and tons of gems from all over the World!
Immediately I put my eye on a beautiful Tanzanian Ruby lot, although I try to keep cool, it was hard not to open my eyes as an owl! So that was my first pick, around 350 kg of large beautiful colour ruby (it seems like a lot but Ruby is pretty heavy). I am a very curious person and gladly they allowed me to rummage through their entire warehouse; I was opening closed sacs, boxes, it was like Christmas! After few minutes of this mini gem hunt I found this enormous Tourmaline Crystals from Madagascar, never seen in my life! They were three thick slices belonging to a single crystal that had around 30 cm in diameter. The crystal was combed at the mine to try see their translucency, luckily the three “slices” were undamaged. They weighed 39,000 – 42,000 – 32500 carats respectively (OMG!) Together with that a super gemmy rubelite bag with small crystals that I practically took as hostage (since I saw in their faces they were not very keen into selling them).
I selected other stones as well and then we went into the office with a hand written list of my selection. So, we had some tea, I kindly asked them to give me their best price and discussed for a little bit, they wrote on the paper and I just saw a number so big I was not sure what to say. I asked again to please give me a good price and we all just kept quiet for around 20 minutes, not a single word; finally they wrote a new number and I was very happy to accept it. A hand shake and promise of payment on an agreed date was enough to close this deal (this is one of the things I love most about this business, deals are made old school, just a handshake and your word and we are talking of some serious numbers.
Eleven years after this little adventure, we finally decided to carve these babies into this statement Falcon sculpture. Its 44 cm in length from tip to tip of wings, to my understanding possibly the largest Tourmaline ever carved.
