Though being able to own this beautiful and historic piece of pop culture would be an absolute dream come true for some, fifty thousand dollars in an awfully steep price to pay for an accessory – even one that was worn by one of the biggest fashion icons of the last century.

Those of us who have budgets that won’t quite allow for fifty thousand dollar necklaces might want to take a cue from Jackie herself and look to simulated gems for accessorizing.  Of course, this particular piece of simulated gem jewelry is a bit pricier because of the former owner, lab created gems as a whole are much more affordable than naturally mined gems.

An engagement ring, a pair of earrings or a pendant with a natural diamond, ruby or emerald might cost several thousand dollars from a retailer, but the very same piece crafted from cubic zirconia could be had for a fraction of what the natural gem jewelry cost.  You won’t lose and beauty, any sparkle or even any quality from a lab created gem piece that’s in the same setting as a natural gem piece – but you will save quite a bit of money.  Cz and other simulated gems give all of us the opportunity to look like fashion icons and celebrities, without having to pay the astronomical prices of naturally mined gems.

July’s modern birthstone is the ruby and you don’t get a whole lot more bold and brilliant than a perfectly cut, eye catching red ruby.  The only problem is that high quality, naturally mined ruby is pretty hard to come by these days and therefore very expensive.  Rubies can be treated in various ways in an attempt to improve the quality and clarity, but even the lesser grade natural stones that have been died or heated can bring with them a pretty hefty price tag.

If you are planning on buying naturally mined ruby you should take great care to ensure that you are actually getting what you are paying for because this beautiful gem can be treated to improve appearance.  No one wants to find out that they spent top dollar for a flawless natural gem only to find out later that what they actually purchased was a gem of average quality that was treated to appear of higher quality.

One way to ensure that you are getting the very best value is to purchase an optically flawless and inclusion free lab created ruby.  With lab created rubies, you get top quality every single time while at the same time saving hundreds or even thousands of dollars on your purchase.  Owning perfect natural gems would be nice, if you had the money, but if you want to wear the most beautiful and colorful jewelry imaginable this Summer and still have money to spare you might want to look into lab created ruby jewelry.

Though there have been some reported increases in sales and profits among some major jewelry retailers, we haven’t quite seen the economic bounce back that many individuals and businesses would probably have liked.  This may hamper some people’s ability to keep up with the trends exactly as predicted because the cost of natural gems could put costs out of reach of shoppers who are on a budget, but thankfully for those who are fashion conscious and budget limited, lab created gems can help us keep up with the trends regardless of income.

The cost of real diamonds does fluctuate, unfortunately even when natural diamond prices are at their lowest, they can still be out of the financial reach of many people, but cubic zirconia can mimic the look of the most brilliant and flawless natural diamond for a tenth of the cost.  So it doesn’t mater how big and bold the trends go, because with cz and other lab gems, you’ll be able to achieve the biggest and boldest looks for a fraction of the price.

Unlike many attempts to replicate fashion that fall short, cz so closely mimics the look and feel of a natural diamond that it takes the trained eye of a professional with special equipment to accurately tell them apart.  So even though you’ll be spending hundreds (or even thousands) less, you’ll still be able to achieve the very same look and quality of someone who opted for natural gem jewelry.  You don’t have to have a celebrity’s salary to keep up with trends, just opt for cz over natural diamonds and you can achieve any look while remaining within your budget.

The cz samples replicate the unique naturally mined diamond pieces in every aspect and allow retailer’s to safely and comfortably show the entire collection without any fear of losing more valuable inventory to theft.  Each of the cz samples reflects pieces of the line that are in stock and ready to ship at the customer’s desire.

In light of the increase in jewelry store heists and robberies over the course of the last few years, this effort by the jewelry manufacturer to keep their retail stores and employees safe while still being able to sell the type of inventory that they have become known for is quite commendable.

Other retailers seem to be on board with systems similar to this as well, Robbins’ Diamonds has a showroom with open cases of cz replicas of their most popular sellers for customers to peruse and try on prior to making their decision.  They advertise that this style of shopping allows the customer to find exactly what they are looking for from the showcases, but then when they make a purchase the item they receive will be custom crafted for them and therefore will have not been handled by dozens of other customers prior to the purchase.

An open showcase showroom would be extremely dangerous if the pieces contained within were crafted with real diamonds, but due to cz’s affordability it isn’t nearly as great an attraction for thieves, which means that both product and employees will be safe in this type of environment.

This trend for safety is a great development, but it may not be too long before some consumers realize that if the very affordable cz is good enough to make an “exact” replica of a much more expensive diamond – that it may be the better option to purchase, especially for those who are looking to save a little money.

One of Goodwill’s Pennsylvania stores hit a bit of a jackpot when one of the sorters, a retired jeweler, came across a 2.6 carat diamond ring among the more traditional donations of costume jewelry.  Though it may not be too unusual for a Goodwill store to get an unexpected surprise among their donations every once in a while, this piece, valued at more than seventeen thousand dollars is by far the biggest donation of all of the Goodwill stores in the surrounding area.

Had it not been for the fact that the jewelry sorter going through the large quantities of donations was a retired jeweler, it’s very likely that this ring would have ended up with a price tag comparable to the dozens of other rings crafted from cubic zirconia and lab created gems.

This will, no doubt, spark a new found interest in the jewelry cases at Goodwill stores nationwide, where shoppers will be searching among the beautifully crafted lab gem jewelry in an effort to find another one in a million donation that slipped past the jewelry sorter.  If it weren’t for the fact that cz was so similar in appearance to naturally mined diamonds, something like this would never even be an issue, but the brilliance and beauty of lab created diamonds easily gives them a chance to be mistaken for the real thing – even to someone who has experience with jewelry.

The happy ending to this story lies in the fact that the very deserving Goodwill Industries gets the benefit of the mammoth donation in the Pennsylvania store – and the from the fact that there should be a very noticeable increase in shoppers at Goodwill  jewelry counters in the foreseeable future.

Now I’m sure this situation wasn’t too funny for the parties involved at the time, seeing that the stone was worth in the neighborhood of twenty thousand dollars, but as reporters revealed that the hefty natural stone was recovered after the store owners followed the pup around for a few days to recover the lost treasure once it had time to pass – the story became much more entertaining.

As funny as this particular story is, it does bring something about jewelry to light.  Accidents happen – even to jewelry store owners and dealers who are accustomed to handling these items carefully as a part of their livelihood.  The very same accidents can, and do happen to people every day; precious jewels are misplaced, lost or stolen and many times they can’t be recovered in a manner as hilarious as that mentioned above – sometimes they can’t be recovered at all.

Natural gems are wonderful to have, but with the large investment that is needed to acquire them it makes much more of an unpleasant situation should anything ever happen to them.  Jewelry is meant to be enjoyed and to make you feel glamorous and beautiful – but how can you enjoy something fully if you are constantly worried that something may happen to it.

This is the perfect reason for retail jewelers to stock an ample supply of jewelry crafted from wholesale lab created gems.  Lab created gems are just as beautiful as their natural counterparts, but they come at a fraction of the cost – they are replaceable, even for those who are on a budget.  This means that lab crafted gem jewelry can truly be worn for the reasons that jewelry was meant to be worn – it can be enjoyed and make someone feel completely beautiful, without any fear of what may happen.

You could go all out and buy natural emerald jewelry to accent your St. Patrick’s Day outfit, but that could end up being one very pricey accessory – or you could get earrings, a necklace and a bracelet crafted from wholesale lab created gems for a fraction of the cost.

In all likelihood, even if you are going to a reasonably upscale party, on St. Patrick’s Day there is liable to be at least a little bit of rowdy activity.  There will be big crowds and plenty of action and, as is the case with most St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, plenty of alcohol readily available.  Imagine how you’d feel if you spent several hundred dollars on a natural emerald piece of jewelry and during your night on the town it got lost, stolen or misplaced?

Sure you wouldn’t feel great about losing your beautiful lab created emerald jewelry either, but the impact on your wallet would be a lot less severe.  St. Patrick’s Day is a night were you should be able to dress up, cut loose and have fun – with beautiful lab created emeralds you can perfectly accessorize your outfit and truly look like a million bucks, without having spent much at all.  It won’t matter if you’re going to a friend’s party, the corner bar or a fancy restaurant to celebrate – your beautiful lab created emeralds will be the perfect green accessory to pull your outfit together.

Lab, created, lab created and synthetic are all used to describe gems created in the laboratory under precisely controlled and exacting conditions. A lab created gem has exactly the same optical, chemical and tangible properties as the natural gem it reproduces. High-quality lab created gems not only look, feel and sparkle like their natural counterparts, they are chemically identical. Without a microscope or laboratory testing, even gem experts may be unable to tell whether a gem was created by nature or in the lab.

To be labeled a synthetic gem, a lab created gem must precisely resemble the natural gem it mimics. If even the tiniest variation in chemistry is present between the created gem and a natural gem, the lab created gemstone cannot be labeled a true synthetic. In fact, labeling of lab created gems as synthetic, lab-grown, laboratory-grown, lab-created or laboratory-created is strictly regulated by the Federal Trade Commission. Simulated gems, on the other hand, are manmade gems that may resemble the natural gem but are chemically, physically and optically different from nature’s creation.

To find out more about cubic zirconia and lab created gems and to purchase the finest, top-quality loose cz and loose lab gems, visit the website of respected international wholesale supplier PehnecGems at www.Pehnec.com.

Because of the name similarity, laymen sometimes confuse cubic zirconia with the naturally occurring mineral zircon. Although these crystals may both exhibit a diamond’s clear sparkle, the two couldn’t be more different chemically. Cubic zirconia is a zirconium dioxide while zircon is a zirconium silicate. It’s like the chemical difference between sodium chloride, common table salt, and sodium carbonate, washing soda used to launder clothes. The names may be similar, but you’d never sprinkle sodium carbonate on your morning eggs!

The same degree of difference is true of zircon and cubic zirconia. Zircon is Earth’s oldest naturally occurring mineral. Tiny 4.4 billion year old grains of zircon have been found in quartz conglomerates in Western Australia. (The Earth’s age is currently dated at 4.56 billion years.) Only very rarely does zircon produce a gem-size crystal and these quickly degrade due to the mineral’s natural radiation. More commonly, small grains of this accessory mineral, eroded from igneous and metamorphic rocks in the Earth’s crust, are plentifully found in beach sand.

Another synthetic diamond look alike is moissanite, a silicon carbide that just came on the jewelry market last year. Found in nature only as a trace mineral in meteorites from outer space and in kimberlites, igneous rock formations that also produce diamonds, synthetic moissanite can now be lab grown to jewelry quality carat-size crystals.

Cubic zirconia, moissanite and natural diamonds are nearly identical to each other in appearance and physical properties. Cubic zirconia differs from diamonds in that cz has a higher specific gravity (it weighs nearly twice as much as a diamond) and lacks a diamond’s ability to conduct heat. Moissanite is slightly harder than cz and has a specific gravity slightly lower than a diamond’s. It can conduct heat but, unlike diamonds, also conducts electricity. Despite their differences, cubic zirconia has proved to be a more flexible gem substitute than moissanite because colored cz can be created in any color and cut into any shape, unlike its kissing cousin.

Cubic zirconia, colored cz and other synthetic gems look and sparkle just like Mother Nature’s own creations. Cubic zirconia has the same chemical signature as diamonds but creation under controlled laboratory conditions allows each cz gem to be created flawlessly and with perfect coloration, something Mother Nature rarely achieves. In fact, many women prefer the deep coloration and exceptional brilliance of lab sapphires and lab rubies to their natural counterparts.  Cubic zirconia and lab created gems are particularly popular right now, not just for their affordable price but because of the environmental and social strife that taint blood diamonds and gems. Choosing jewelry crafted with white cubic zirconia or colored cz is a socially responsible choice that both giver and recipient can feel good about.

Choosing to give their sweetie jewelry for the holidays is an easy decision for most men. The trouble comes in deciding what to give. Choosing just the right gift can be a little intimidating. Here are some tips that will ensure that your special someone is thrilled when she raises the lid on that little box.

• Decide on a budget and stick to it. Jewelry created with loose cubic zirconia set in precious metals is not only beautiful but extremely affordable.
• Choose jewelry that matches your favorite gal’s style. Pay attention to the way she dresses, the jewelry she wears now, her favorite colors and the things she likes to do best. Choose jewelry that will complement her personal style and her lifestyle. Stay tuned; we’ll give you some specific tips and ideas in Monday’s post.
• Ask her best friend or her sister what her favorite jewelry is or if she has her eye on something special.
• Ask your sweetie to create a wish list. Cruise the Internet or page through a jewelry catalog or visit a jewelry store together and ask her to show you what she likes.