In August 2014 I took a ride on a Harley Davidson Road King around Flathead Lake, Montana, visiting rock shops to find Montana Agate (also called moss agate), a chalcedony with black moss-like inclusions found in Yellowstone river riverbeds.
Rock shops visited: Junction Rock Shop, Montana Within Rock Shop LLC, Kehoe’s Agate Shop, Mineralholics LLC, The Treasure Outpost in Whitefish, Rocks and Things Metaphysical.
Custom commission: a gold cherry blossom ring for Laura, an oncology nurse with a full-body Japanese cherry blossom tattoo. 4-month process from sketches to wax model to gold casting, with a 5-karat rough black diamond center and 5 triangular diamonds between petals.
A necklace using rough grey diamonds drilled and attached with 28-gauge gold wire (balled up with an acetylene torch) onto an 18-karat gold chain. Diamonds are uniquely heat-tolerant, though occasionally one splits and flies through the studio!
Educational post about colored diamonds: impurities cause color (boron=blue, nitrogen=yellow, radiation=green, plastic deformation=red/pink). Mentions the 35-carat Wittelsbach blue diamond ($24M at Christie’s 2008) and BPM 37093 – the largest known diamond in the universe (a white dwarf star nicknamed Lucy).
