The Tanzanite Story

[Music] [Music] tanzanite a gemstone phenomenon of the mid 20th century though the stone has been in the ground for millions of years it has only been discovered in recent times and because of its highly prized violet blue color it is secured a place on collectors lists of most wanted part of tanzanites intrigue is its rarity there's only one place in the world the stone has ever been found and that's in the rugged landscape of Eastern Africa deep underground in the Mara lani hills of northern Tanzania because of its limited supply tanzanite is considered to be 1,000 times rarer than diamonds but the passion for the stone lies in its vivid deep violet blue color I bought an absolutely magnificent six carat tanzanite from my wife the best color I've seen I haven't seen one that good since and she wears it every single day and she loves that stone and every time I look at it I can't believe the cut even myself a gem dealer with 26 years experience whenever I see that stone in daylight I shake my head and I say I've never it's better color than I ever remember it and I see it every single day every single day it's better than I remember it that's a great color in a gemstone tanzanite is known as a trichroic gemstone meaning it throws off three different colors when viewed from different directions depending on how you look at it tanzanite displays hues of blue violet and reddish bronze varying in shades of deep rich saturated colors to lighter tones of lavender and blue tanzanite like all other gemstones is softer than a diamond on the Mohs hardness scale it ranks as six to seven verses diamonds hardness factor of ten but it's a stone that's appropriate for jewelry that doesn't see heavy wear and just needs a little extra care to guard against scratching tanzanite was named for its exotic origins and certainly that contributes to the stones mystique for there's nowhere else in the world where it's mined therefore some day it will run out so for a relatively new discovery tanzanite has become very popular it was discovered in 1967 huge demand people talk about tanzanite now in the same breath as diamond ruby emeralds the big three and now the big four tanzanite how did it happen I think it happened because of a number of factors tanzanite has the best blue color in the world the only thing that can approach it is a gem quality Kashmir sapphire that can be twenty five thousand dollars a carrot or a gem gem quality Burma sapphire that can be six to ten thousand dollars a carat the best handed nut on earth looks as good or better than those two colors it's the best blue on earth but what is it cost five hundred six hundred seven hundred a carat it's like it's like being able to buy a Maserati for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the price of a Toyota Camry thirty thousand no it is awesome tanzanite is a tough gemstone as far as sources there's a region in Africa called the Mozambique belt and this one geological area has a lot of processes that occurs over 500 million years now difficulty is it took a very specific series of events to occur to reduce the tanzanite and it had to be in the presence of things like the vanadium there's certain elements that had to be there unfortunately as far as I can tell the present that one series of events that created tanzanite only occurred in one small area in northern portion of Tanzania there's been no other fine made that duplicate that source the surrounding countryside is a study of contrasts as you drive along bumpy gravel roads you experience everything from lush and green areas to almost desert light conditions at the mine and in nearby communities most often when people think of Tanzania they picture Mount Kilimanjaro standing at an elevation of nineteen thousand 336 feet Achille as the locals say is the highest mountain in Africa and one of the largest freestanding mountains on the planet [Music] the surrounding habitat is home to one of the largest animal populations in the world [Music] [Music] you can see them all in the national parks just a short distance from the tanzanite mines the un'goro coral crater the most famous of them all [Music] in goru goru crater is the largest collapsed volcanic crater in the world fourteen kilometers of isolated natural beauty [Music] often referred to as the eighth wonder of the world the crater is surrounded by a ring of extinct volcanoes [Music] and the floor is a natural sanctuary for some thirty thousand animals indigenous people known as the Maasai live with their livestock in harmony with the wildlife and the environment this is the land where tanzanite was formed over 500 million years ago the Crystal sat idle until their discovery in 1967 exactly who discovered tanzanite is a matter for debate one story credits a Maasai herdsmen who picked up some stones after seeing them sparkling in the Sun regardless of how this gym was discovered it quickly emerged as one of the most prized stones of our time even coined the gem stone of the 20th century so what exactly is tanzanite and how does it get that distinctive color tanzanite is a mineral called zoisite found really only in one place on earth which is part of the mystique of tanzanite zoisite in the rough is actually kind of a brownish greenish color but a remarkable thing happens to the colour when you heat it to around five or six hundred degrees it takes on this dramatic violet is bluish colour that's the best on earth tanzanite color ranges from a rich violet blue to bluish violet to many shades in between the most coveted color is of blue that shows a purplish hue shimmering around it highly prized in sizes greater than 10 carats some rough actually comes out of the earth that way but most often to get that color tanzanite must be heated as many as three times at a temperature around 500 degrees Celsius or 932 degrees Fahrenheit tanzanite you really do have to heat in order to get that gorgeous violet blue color some tanzanite that is unheated really doesn't have that that very desirable color this is a piece of rough this is how it looks once it's mined out of the Maneri hills in Arusha Tanzania once we get the rough we see how we can get a clean piece out of it we see the shape we try to get out of it if whatever is appropriate to make a round of it or trillion out of it or an emerald cut out of it whatever is more appropriate whichever can give us a better yield for the stone a better color for the stone we preformed it some of the stones like silver and sapphires have to be heated before doing the preforms are doing the polished but stones make tanzanite we heat them after doing the whole process after polishing the stone once it is preformed we'd get it polished we have to finish the pavilion art first we try to get each and every individual facet on the stone try to make sure it's 100% accurate the qulet is in the center the cutting is perfect that is where all the cutting part and all the flaws are actually taken out we make sure that there is no inclusion in the piece we make sure that it is 100% clean and it looks good after cutting we loop the piece at least from five or six different angles and see that there is no problem with the stone after figuring that out we take the stone to the furnace and we take the piece we put it in a pot and fill the pot with plaster of Paris and dig the stone into it and put the stone in the furnace we have to bring the temperature of the furnace in the beginning to 600 degrees and we just turned off the furnace after that we make sure that it stays there for good enough time so that this furnace can cool off it takes almost 12 hours to cool off and then when the piece comes out it changes its color completely it turns from brown to blue the fact that tanzanite is heat treated doesn't in any way detract from its value the value remains the same that's part of the fashioning process just like cutting and Cobbing and fashioning and polishing the gem heat treating as part of that process to extract the natural beauty that Mother Nature put into that gem but mankind needs to pull out but the first step is to find it in the quest to discover tanzanite you experience the wild thrills of the environment and the culture of the Maasai people the only known source of tanzanite located in the Mara Lani hills at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro is nothing short of a geological phenomenon as you travel with us to the mines you can experience a half a billion years of Earth's history consider what it took to form tanzanite a complex series of geological events just the right combination of pressure and temperature and the proper mix of chemical elements tanzanite crystals are found in sausage-shaped pockets they exist weathered and exposed as well as deep within the earth surrounding the tanzanite areas are several indicator minerals chief among them rhodolite and tsavorite garnet others celebrated gems this means that most of the rock in a tanzanite mine is not tanzanite in fact about 70 percent of a miners time is spent removing tons of earth to reach small pockets of tanzanite only about a third of their time has been actually pulling the gem out of the ground tanzanite mining is probably one of the toughest types of mining a lot of times when you're money you'll find veins and you can follow the vein and pretty much a straight line path tans nice a little different it forms that they call boo Don's a French word meaning a sausage it's kind of like this kind of oval to rounded type of cavity that has certain trace elements they look for and a lot of times when those trace owns there they'll go into the cavity of Bhutan and they'll find crystals of tanzanite but the problem is not every time you find one of the boudin's do you find tanzanite you may find something else the trouble is you can search and search and search and maybe hit one in five or ten that even have some usable crystals the strike zone or tanzanite barren area extends just shy of four miles in length that's it within that area there are more than 200 mines in four main blocks each with its own unique characteristics tanzanite is mined in basic a six kilometer strip that's probably less than 2 miles wide what the government has done is divided up into four different sections blocks a B C and D and they give out leases and we have one of those leases you can go into that area and mine actively mined blocks B and D are filled with hundreds of small mining operations Block B has a reputation for producing large amounts of tanzanite while D is known for exceptional color Mining inside blocks B and D is very primitive there are a few exceptions like this mine that is mechanized to help workers into the mine most are accessible only by ladder he was pretty interesting to walk into some of these individual mine sites where they had their small plots they didn't vary too much but one would have a shed always some type of shed to kind of keep the Sun off the opening and then you see this pit was very dark pit and the first thing notice that there's a ladder going down but what is interesting is that ladder may only go down 50 60 feet then all sudden you have to get off get onto a tight ledge get onto another ladder that goes down at an angle maybe then get off again sometimes you'll change five or six ladders before you get to the bottom and all these shafts are running at odd angles so there's no straight shaft there trying to find the boo Don's or these sausage-like veins that kind of snake through the earth on the surface these plots are clamped stacked one on top of the other but once underground miners can dig in any direction there are rules amid all this chaos if miners dig and hit another miners pocket they must back up 15 meters and go in another direction tanzanite mining is primitive at best you'll see things like picks and shovels occasionally see a hydraulic jack but that's the rarity now it is interesting at night when we were sitting there eating you can hear sounds off in the distance when we were first there we thought it was thunder rolling thunder then we realized that it was the miners going down into the depths of the mines placing charges coming back out and setting the charges off so what you'd hear in the distance is rolling woman and it sounded like storms it was actually the miners clearing the way to get to some luodans for tanzanite while small-scale miners run blocks a B and D a major corporation mines all of Block C this interest controls roughly 30 percent of the mining area and also by significant amounts in the market from the other miners inside Block C miners have the advantage of machines to help carry out debris and process tanzanite ruff you're looking inside the main shaft of the most mechanized mine in Tanzania here miners spend long exhausting hours pulling bag after bag out of the ground not one of which has any tanzanite in it remember about three-quarters of a miners time is spent removing debris in their quest to reach a tanzanite pocket during a typical day inside the mine miners dig and fill their bags with debris using a cable system the bags are attached by rope and sent down the mine tunnel using a machete each bag is cut from the cable past from minor to minor then poured into the Skip and sent out of the mine for dumping the contrast between Block C and the others is evident above ground as well go and look at a B and D in their pockmarked with holes and buildings and it it looks like a wild west town you go to C Block and it looks like Serengeti they've reclaimed all the land they do all their mining underground and the top looks absolutely beautiful and pristine just like the rest of the country tanzanite processing is also state-of-the-art block sees machinery has the capacity to process 10,000 tons per month in a single shift this machine sorts through the rough discarding TACA TACA Swahili for waste anything tanzanite weight or heavier continues on for sorting and preparation for sale on the market no matter what mining block produces the tanzanite it all travels to one central location the buying district in Arusha about one hour's drive from the mines at the base of Mount Kilimanjaro the buying district serves as the hub for all the miners and traders needing to sell and buy tanzanite situated halfway between Cape Town and Cairo Arusha offers a taste of modern Africa as a cosmopolitan Center as an historic site were important modern African peace treaties and agreements are signed and is the starting point for many safaris [Music] Arusha is also the heart of tanzanite Trey Cooley Ondoy Road serves as the gem buying Center the street is lined with gem offices dealer C traders all day hoping to negotiate good prices on all kinds of gems from tsavorite aquamarine and Ruby to most of all tanzanite the country's prized gem well outside the doors in the morning you have a bunch of people start lining up early they're all trying to get there with their small amounts of rough and they'll amp open the doors and they come in one right after another they sit down they put the stones out in a long time these are very small parcels you'd be amazed deals are made on everything from large tanzanite lots to small parcels brought in by local Maasai tribesmen all parcels are given an initial inspection knocking or copping helps the buyer determine the largest usable piece from the rough after copying an offer is made if they agree on a price the trader is paid immediately in cash tanzanite is then cut into various shapes and sizes before being sold around the world these are the pieces of rough there mined in Tanzania the local miner is the messiah tribes go to the mines deep under the earth and they find some raw big rocks so they take out all the dirt and clean it and they bring it to us once it comes to us our office our expert people in Arusha they look at the piece and they figure out what they can get out of it you know sometimes a 200 carat piece of rough will only give you two small pieces it may not be very clean but sometimes when it's clean you can get a big rock out of it you can get a big beautiful stone out of it but it requires a lot of expertise and experience for a person to figure out what he can get out of a stone it can be very confusing for a person also to judge the piece might look but once you start cutting it you might start finding new flaws and a new inclusions in it your cutters they see it they tell you how what kind of a shape you can get out of it what kind of weight you can get out of it and we have to make all those projections before sometimes you can be off and but most of the times because you are so experienced in it you get the right projections this person here is an expert in looking at a piece of rough he makes marks on the cleanliness of the stone he then sends it over to a person who then cuts the piece of rough he sees where it has to be cut from and he cuts it according then it comes back over here and then we decide what shape we want to take out of the stone for example this piece if it is clean enough if it has come back from him he would give it to him he is an expert in making the shape of the piece we will discuss it between ourselves and you know sometimes he might have a different opinion and we might have a different opinion but usually they're very accurate because of this they they process hundreds and thousands of stones [Music] if you want to make a calibrated piece out of it we'll check it over here and then it goes over there this is the quality stable for a 40 current piece it took them almost I think 10 hours of polishing work was required because it has thousands of fascist I mean one son and every facet has to be put there once the stone is faceted it's ready to be heated to it's blue violet color the final stage of the tanzanite preparation process the tanzanite trade is a way of life for the Masai people their villages are built around the mines and their culture is impacted by the business mine culture is pretty interesting you'll see a lot of different groups there now you can see the workers and actually go down into the mines and do a lot of the labor but you also see a lot of other people like Masai tribesman surrounding the mine area now the Masai tribesman are like brokers or they can be buyers they capture a lot of material coming out of that area and buy it directly from the small individual mine owners they then take it back in the town and sew it and make their money not only is their livelihood affected by tanzanite mining their lives are impacted by the corporate mining interest in Block C for example the corporation assisted with the upgrades of a primary school and construction of a secondary school and community center perhaps the company's biggest contribution was building and maintaining the access road to the mine with so many factors to consider what does the future hold for tanzanite as we've all heard there's there's 12 to 15 years of tanzanite left in the ground and it's a gorgeous gemstone when it when a gemstone like that that has a very broad appeal when the when the mines dry up and there's no more supply the price goes through the roof so unless a new source for tanzanite is discovered the gem will be mined out within a generation and children in the 21st century and beyond will be left to gaze at its beauty in private collections or in museums around the world [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: JTV Live Now

Views: 101,528

Keywords: tanzanite, jewelry, jtv, jewelry television, tanzanite jewelry, tanzanite history, tanzanite information, tanzanite story

Id: SsLGAHRabCo

Length: 24min 27sec (1467 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 08 2020