Jewelry Blog

> The most famous type of jade carved in China is from Burma, with shades of green, lavender, yellow, white and grey. Naturally these colors form over millions of years from minerals in the rock. However, its the emerald green color that jadeite produces so well, that is highly sought after by artwork collectors. This emerald green jade called “Imperial Jade” is colored by chromium. Other colors are influenced by iron (green and brown) and manganese is thought to produce the violet colors. And today, most colored jade is dyed.
Jade is remarkably tough, used by many early civilizations for axes, knives and weapons. Because of its smooth even texture, jade was soon carved into ornaments – and it wasn’t until 1863 that it was realized that Jade was being applied to two different minerals: jadeite and nephrite. Jadeite is almost never found in individual crystals and is composed of microscopic interlocking crystals that produce a very tough material. The nephrite variety is composed of fibrous crystals inter-twinned in a tough compact mass. Nephrite is more abundant than jadeite and has fewer color varieties – usually less intense dark spinach greens, white, browns, and black.