Weight: 5.12 ct.
Dimensions: 9.75 x 9.75
Clarity: Loupe clean at 10x
Original designed by Arya Akhavan, and Faceted by Scott Maier
Origin: Umba Valley, Tanzania
Comments:
This gem is cut in a design by Arya Akhavan called 'Pines of the Janiculum' - It's a showy and bright cut, that does this special material great justice.
Malaya garnets used to have a reputation for being hard for miners in Africa to sell to gem rough buyers, because they were the colors that didn't match the majority of the other garnets in production.
Over time, these unique colors began to gain favor, and in the last fifteen years, the market has flipped, and Malaya garnets -- the oddballs -- are a rare treat, for facetors, jewelry makers, and customers too -
The more common garnet colors are red, purplish, and pink. Malaya garnets seem like they got doses of all three. Orange is in there too. It's as if you mixed up three different colors of fruit punch, and could kind of still see glimmers of each one in the final color. In my experience, they tend to be heavy on red, but orange and pink feature strongly as well, especially in different kinds of light, or times of day.