Is this the same emerald?

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The emerald is app. 6.8 carats.
As I gave it up for an auction it looked like the first photo. The second photo is from the auction catalog today.
Has the aucion house added value to the emerald by their treatment of it?

Thank yoy in advance for your replies.

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It mostly looks like different lighting conditions to me.

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Thank you, Mike :blush:
What is this emeralds true color. The color in the first photo og the color in the second photo … or doesn’t it matter at all?

I actually prefer the first pic of the emerald! It is a mossy kind of green but the second photo must b horrible lighting–and thats a catalogue pic?! Too bad! It looks like it has no fire at all, no true deep color…

Thanks for your feedback, Ast530 :slight_smile:

The emarald has an ice cold green color. They just cleaned and polished it, they say. More than once I asked to have a certificate on the ring. But no, there is no need for it when it is a Bulgari ring. Some places they didn’t do maunted rings, in other countries I should pay customs to have a certificate, they claimed.

I’m very much in doubt whether to just pick up the ring and pay the auction house the $ 5,000 they want if I pull the ring out of the auction.

you have too much money!why did you put it up for aucton if you were going to pull it out and pay a high FEE??

I’m new to the gemstone and jewelry trade, but something here doesn’t seem right.
If you don’t mind my asking.
1.What auction house is it, and why would they allow an item without proof of validity?
2. What is going to be the opening bid?
3. Why would you not have it certified? If not the ring, then at least the stone. Would that not UP the value of your piece? Uncertified worth $. Certified worth $$$$$$$
Emeralds from different origins command different prices

You are very welcome to ask :slight_smile:

  1. You don’t need to know the name of the auction house, and I don’t need a potential case of libel.
    This auction house quite often allows more expensive juwelry without certificates. Maybe because they are not responsible for their assessments. I learnt this a week ago.

  2. The opening bid is 11,500 USD.

  3. I know nothing about jewelry and was adviced to contact this auction house for an appraisel. The “expert” talked the emerald down, and I thought the buyers might have been cheated on as the ring was bought in the first place. But it was two other jewelry that were handed in at the same time that gave me second thougts about their work ethics and professionalism. After this I became aware that the emerald ring needed a certificate, but the ring was in the hands of the auction house, and the rest is history. Now I need to get the ring back as cheaply as possible. After this I will do it right :upside_down_face:

Thank you for sharing your beautiful ring.

To answer your question, without having your ring in front of me, I would say these photos appear to be of the same ring. The second photo appears to be of the ring cleaned up and professionally photographed. It is really hard to say if the emerald in both photos are of the same gemstone without the ring in front of me. My questions to you is: have your jeweler cleaned and re-oiled your emerald? If so, did it look clearer?

As to price: it is always best to document the jeweler that created this ring. Also having all gemstones certified always reassures buyers of the authenticity of the gemstones and the metal of the ring.

To give you some perspective as to possible auction prices, here are 2 respected auction house listings of significant emerald and diamond rings (both were certified as natural gemstones):

Usually there is a minimum fee to withdraw an item from an auction. That should be detailed in the terms of the listing agreement. I would advise to read through the agreement you signed.

Once you have your ring back, I would suggest that this ring be sent into GIA to be certified and also appraised as to approximate market value.

I hope this helps!

I am so grateful that you all take the time to help me with this <3

You know as much as I do as for your first question. The first photo was taken with a mobile phone by an employee at the auction house department where I handed over the ring. It struck me when I drove home that I had to have a photo of what the ring looked like when I handed it over. The ring was then sent to their main department. So the transformation of the emerald has happened in the auction house.

It is a Bulgari ring, and you are perfectly right, it has to be certified. The last two month I have seen on auction sites how important a certificate is to the price.

I have never signed on the terms of the auction house, but they have been attached to an email, and I think this is enough to make the terms legal in the country I live in.

“If the seller has entered into an agreement with XXX to put an item up for auction and subsequent cancels the agreement, the seller must pay XXX it total fee income (ie both sales and buyer’s fee and basic fee), cf. section 10.1 and 10.2 as well as applicable purchase terms as XXX would have obtained by a sale of the item to it stated lowest rating.”

The sales fee is 16% and the buyer’s fee is 30%.

Can I claim that the auction house has reduced the value of the emerald by their treatment of this? In any case, they have done so without my consent.

I would have to refer you to a lawyer that specializes in the gem and jewelry trades. I personally don’t know of one. This is a legal question in my eyes that needs the legal expertise of a licensed lawyer.
I hope this helps.

Sabrina, first i must say…to my knowledge it is common practise to oil an Emerald. I suspect this is the case here. There is nothing wrong with that but should be disclosed to buyer.

This does not look like a case of just different lighting.

Emeralds of this size should always have a certificate with it. It could mean the difference between 10,000 and 100,000 of dollars.

This could be a hurtful life lesson. I do agree talk to a lawyer.

Sorry for the late reply. I’ve been to the capital to see the ring. I found a GIA certified contact that I met with at the auction house. We were breathed in the neck by the staff today. Probably because I wrote the auction house yesterday that I would withdraw the ring from the auction. They replied that I should pay nearly 7,000 UDS to do so. I thought I should pay linked to the minimum bid, but I should pay linked to the lowest appraisal. It is very smart that they are not the same.

I didn’t get the ring with me today as they had no “customer service” at the show room. Tomorrow I will settle with the auctions house when I have heard from Christies. Lawyers will take years. They pull everything in length.

The emerald hasn’t this cold green color as in the catalog. We took photos with each our mobiles. My Samsung made the emerald more blue than it is and the Huawei more green. The color is something in between, closest to the Huawei photo. The emerald is unbelievably beautiful in reality.


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Hi Eric,
I was at the GRS to have a certificate on the emerald. It turned out to be an untreated russian emerald which might be difficult to sell at the moment. What do you think?

I am sorry for the delay in responding. I do understand your concern with the on going troubles with Russia. I do not have experience International markets, in reguard to how sales would fluctuate do to public opinon. If you can prove that it is of Russian ancestry that could bring a better price, due to the Love of Emeralds like those owned by Catherine the Great. This is info the the Auction house could use for their benefit and yours.
Sometime, individuals that can afford this size jewelry might not be concerned about political trouble but rather where it was mined.

I do wish you all the luck possible. Please keep us posted.

Thanks for wishing me luck. This is probably needed.

I talked to Christie’s head of jewelry and he said that the only thing that sell now is Columbian emeralds, -thus I shouldn’t send the Russian emerald ring to him. He has been extremely helpful, so I have absolutely no bad feelings. However, I forgot to tell him that GRS thinks this stone is an important emerald, Perhabs this information had helped :slightly_smiling_face:

I have also read that collectors don’t care of the origin if it is the right emerald. But this fact is hardly of any help if other auction houses will not take the ring in either.

At GRS I got the book " Magnificent Green - on the trail of the legendary colombian emerald". There is two pages of the emeralds surpassed by Catherine the Great to her daughter-in-law the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna Vladimir Alexandrovich.

By googling I found the beyond article which you might find interesting, In the article there is a documentary “The Jewels of the Romanovs”. The languages in the documentary are Danish, English and French. If there are passages of the Danish language you want translated, please say so. However, there is not a word of Russian emeralds.

The Grand Duchess Vladimir and her Emeralds.