Topaz

The Profitable Miracle Mitress Of

Topaz and color enhancement have not been strangers for the last thirty years. In fact, technology has become the very profitable international and longterm mistress of topaz.

Brazillians were buying straw-colored topaz from Ouro Preto and irradiating it to an orange "imperial" color. But it was not kosher, because it faded with long exposure to the sun.

          From another mine in Ouro Preto, they were also heating the natural browner imperial topaz to a refined bubble-gum pink, which was acceptable because the pink color was stable and greatly improved the unfavorable brownish tone. It would be very interesting to know how many billion dollars of blue topaz have been sold since the irradiation of white topaz was discovered in the 1970's. It may be just the tip of the iceberg for the profits this topaz mistress will make for you, considering the high-tech advancements since the dawn of this millennium, such as Diffused Topaz and Mystic topaz.

          Brazilians and Americans used transparent white topaz to irradiate with cobalt, thereby miraculously transforming it to light blue topaz. It quickly became a staple in jewelry manufacturing and merchadising, selling multi -millions of carats per year.

          Next, someone from California found that irradiating the same white topaz with a linear accelerator, instead of cobalt, produced extraordinarily dazzling shades of sky-blue.

          NOTE: The irradiation of white topaz, unlike the straw-color turning to golden, was more than accepted. It was welcome! Because the changed color was 100% stable and satisfied a fashion requirement for blue gemstones, such as aquamarine, at a very affordable price.

          Then the British, and soon Americans, were using nuclear reactors for neutron irradiation to produce dark

sapphire-blue, christened London-Blue Topaz. the legitimacy for this process was a grey area, as the government became involved vis-a-vis health concerns of the citizenry. When it was shown that safe and sound release-criteria could be satisfactorily demonstrated and proved, fashion trends triumphed because the saturated blue hue fulfilled the female craving for sapphire at a mere fraction of the price.

          On the heels of the government, lawyers soon became involved with topaz's miraculous mistress when some more Californians discovered the combination of linear accelerator and neutron irradiation created the extraordinarily scintillating and dazzling color that was baptized Swiss Blue. It was patentable! Was it the beginning of the beginning, or the beginning of the end for Topaz?

          As you will see, it was a new beginning for topaz's established seductive mistress, technology. She went High-Tech! In fact, topaz's new color-enhancement, modus operand i is going so High-Tech that it ALL requires being patened immediately upon its discovery and development. This, so these small mirables do not take the price-collapse path of CZ.

          It is debatable who was first to discover this new irradiation blend, but it was certainly a Californian. one group, Natural Arts called it "New Blue", but never talked to a lawyer about it. The other group, Mineral Sciences, didn't give it a special name, but patented the precess and forbade other dealers from duplicating it. New Blue was soon marketed through Golay Buchel, who trademarked the name, Swiss Blue Topaz . At that time, Swiss Blue was selling wholesale for $ 5.00/ct. Within 3 years, regardless of Mineral Sciences' patent, other dealers were learing the secret and producing the same color overseas without legal penalty. Before long, Swiss Blue was wholesaling for less than $ 2.00/ct.

The exotic colors of Mystic Topaz

USA Patented Vapor Deposition Process on Natural Topaz

Capture the stunning brilliance of Celestial Topaz

Experaince the dazzling and mystifying kaleidoscope of colors!

Major processors and distributors of surface enchanced designer gemstones by Azotic ™

Doesn't seem like a good product whose price structure could crumble so easily, right? Wrong! The mistress was making new rules because of her shift from mere technology to High-Tech: the problem was the patent holder was not strict enough pursuing patent violators. In light of supply and demand. The best "bread & butter" wholesale creations in the jewelry market generally responded the same, like Amethyst, Citrine and Cubic Zirconium. For easily reproducible fashion-gems, the more the market demands the more the suppliers make. The higher the quantities the lower the price, but the overall profit is well compensated with volume.

After 25+ years deeply immersed in the blue topaz color enhancement business I was

already fascinated and flabbergasted with its attractiveness, adaptabillity and market attraction.

Enter Mystic Topaz at the turn of this century and millennium. Other than its mysteriously shimmering sparkling beauty in so many colors, the real mystery of this phenomenon is why it took so long to catch on in the gemstone and jewelry industry. The first time I heard of it was in September 1998 at the Hong Kong Jewelry show, and there was only that fascinating peacock-green rainbow color. But it didn't seem to be selling so well then, and it sort of faded out of sight in the international jewelry business.

.........Until the 2003 Tucson show! In fact, it had been gaining momentum the previous year, but at Tucson it caught everyone by surprise. The strongest Mystic booth, M.P.Gem at the AGTA Convention Center, looked like there was a kaleidoscope of colors and people were going absolutely berserk for it.

The flaming colors resemble Alexandrite, Ceylon Sapphire, Thai Sapphire, Burmese Ruby, Thai Ruby, Pink Sapphire, Padparascha Sapphire, Canary Diamond and many other exotic colors. So the product stood out astonishingly. Kenneth Moghadam, President of M.P. Gem, sold out his entire stock by the last day of the show.

Many knowledgeable gem dealers and jewelry marketers say the Mystic Topaz consumption will soon bypass that of Blue Topaz, the bread-and-butter darling of the last century's end. So, it appears that this beautiful mystical space-age gemstone has finally achieved its long overdue popularity. And it's certainly not limited to size of the blue topaz market. Mystic Topaz comprises such a large variety of scientillating celestial, oceanic and earthly hues that each of these living colors multiplies the popularity, salability and profitability of this gemstone.

Mid-2004 update: Success can sometimes be a two-edged sword. As of June, 2004 the situation in Azotic has become chaotic. They are demanding payment in advance from all distributors, and there is a backlog of more than one million carats. It now takes three to four months to receive stones back from Azotic. So folks, until/if Azotic fires up another Mystic production facility, do not count on fast deliveries, whatever the quantities, colors, sizes and shapes. Mystic Topaz Technical Considerations: Technically known as Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) applied to NATURAL TOPAZ, the deposition coating is on the pavillion, therefore, the table and crown (face) of the stone is natural topaz and extremely resistant to scratching, which will last as long any natural gemstone. For jewelry manufacture, it is best to mount Mystic Topaz with the same care precautions as one would use mounting emeralds and/or pearls. NOTE: The Mystic Topaz process is covered by a U.S. patent with Azotic Technology, who pursues any potential violators. And now for the definitive miracle of topaz's charming mistress = diffused topaz. At the end of the second millennium, "diffused" coupled with a gem's name was a dirty word in the gemstone and jewelry trade. Notorious scams were disclosed whereby customers bought top gem color blue sapphires and later realized, after a stone was chipped and/or re-polished, the body color of the "gem" was white or sky-blue sapphires that had been surface-diffused to achieve the "gem" color. The American Gem Trade Association (AGTA) issued Trade Alerts advising that the selling of diffused sapphires without full discolosure was unethical and violated AGTA's regulations.

Now, resulting from the beryllium treated orange sapphire revelations from the Thai corundum burners over the last few years, our gemstone trade technical knowledge has been updated significantly. Now we know that diffusion does not deserve such a negative reputation. Rather, diffusion is an integral part of any gemstone's color enhancement for corundum (blue and fancy sapphire, and ruby). Even "surface" diffusion was technically "lattice diffusion", but it only penetrated a few millimeters instead of throughout the stone, like the "kosher" blue sapphires.

Consequently, I was not pessimistically shocked to learn about diffused topaz, except for

the fact that it involved "topaz". The only gemstone diffusion I had ever known was corundum, requiring temperatures in excess of 1,600 Centigrade. Many years ago top crystallography experts agreed that topaz could not possibly be color-enhanced with diffusion because of the heat required. Such a temperature would turn topaz to ash! So, I thought someone was mistaking "diffused" topaz with "Mystic" topaz.

.................Until I talked to Doug Jeffery of Leslie & Co. (http://www.leslieandco.com), the marketing group exclusively distributing diffused topaz for the patent owner, my old longtime friend and old blue-topaz cohort, Richard said he still thought it could be done so, as Nike says, he just did it! And then he patented it as PhDProcess® (Pollak heat Diffusion).

          As mentioned earlier, Mystic Topaz is a coating which does not penetrate the stone's surface, so its mounting in jewelry requires the same precautions to preserve the coating as one would use mounting emeralds and/or pearls.

          Whereas the diffusion of topaz penetartes the surface in millimeters, so is stable in most acids, bases, steam, ultrasonic cleaners, plating solutions and heat applications (like a jeweler's torch). Some like to say the diffusion enhancement is more stable than irradiation.

          So now topaz's miracle mistress was showing her phenomenal siren qualities. It appeared she was defying the laws of nature: capable of transforming topazin to a myriad of marketable colors through previously unapproachable means. And, although not as many colors could be produced with diffusion, it was more stable than Mystic Topaz's vapor deposition.

          But the variety of colors for diffussed topaz is certainly no slouch! The PhD Process® started with EverGreen® Topaz (medium to medium-dark bluish green), which took the gemstone and jewelry industry by storm at the close of the millennium. In terms of complexity and stablility, it was a night-and-day difference from the "dye-fushion" method for standard green quartz.

          Since then Richard, his PhD Process® and Leslie & Co. have expanded their color range of diffused topaz to include:

          - Teal Topaz: Medium Greenish Blue (70/30)
          - Glacier Blue® Topaz: Medium to Medium Dark blue
          - Imperial Champagne® Topaz: Champagne Yellow
          - Royal Red® Topaz: Pink to Red
          - Bi-color Topaz: Still in development

          Today, Diffused and Mystic Topaz have found their way to some T.V. networks, and a few well known American designers are already supplying some higher class department stores in the United States.

          In the end, the selection between the types of color enhancement you prefer, the important points are stability and color variety appealing to the customer's fashion sense.

          If high fashion is your aim, and the basic hues of green, blue, red and yellow are not enough, then you should take a look at Mystic's website: http://www.azotic.us where you'll find more than 80 different colors.