sapphire

Fall in Love with Coloured Gemstones

We’re passionate about helping you find jewellery that’s personal as well as beautiful. While diamonds remain a timeless, classic choice, coloured gemstones are becoming increasingly popular thanks to the individuality, colour and rarity they offer.

Let’s take a look at some of the most popular coloured gemstones we use in our bespoke jewellery, and why we love them.

Colour: Best known for their rich blue colour, sapphires are also found in pink, yellow, green, orange, purple and white.

Hardness: 9 on the Mohs scale, making them one of the hardest gemstones and ideal for everyday wear.

Value: Fine natural sapphires, particularly untreated stones with exceptional colour and clarity, are highly sought after and can command significant prices.

Interesting facts: Sapphires belong to the corundum family. Every colour of corundum except red is classified as sapphire. Some sapphires display a star effect known as asterism, caused by tiny needle-like inclusions reflecting light in a six-rayed star pattern. The rarest sapphires, a delicate pink-orange blend, are known in the trade as padparadscha.

Emerald

Colour: Best known for its rich green colour, emeralds range from light, grassy greens to deep, velvety forest tones.

Hardness: 7.5–8 on the Mohs scale, slightly softer than sapphire and ruby, so a protective setting is recommended for rings.

Value: Fine emeralds with vivid colour and good clarity are highly prized, and exceptional stones can be worth more than a diamond of the same size.

Interesting facts: Emeralds are a variety of the mineral beryl, with their green colour coming from traces of chromium, vanadium and iron (iron is what pushes emerald toward bluer green). Emeralds naturally form with inclusions, often described as a “jardin” (French for garden), which are part of the gemstone’s character rather than a flaw.

Ruby

Colour: Known for its rich red colour, ranging from pinkish-red to deep crimson, with the most prized shade referred to as “pigeon blood” red.

Hardness: 9 on the Mohs scale, the same as sapphire, making it extremely hard-wearing and ideal for everyday jewellery.

Value: High-quality rubies with minimal treatment are among the most valuable gemstones in the world.

Interesting facts: Rubies and sapphires are both varieties of corundum – it’s the presence of chromium that gives ruby its red colour. Like sapphires, rubies can occasionally show asterism, caused by fine needle-like inclusions known as “silk”. Star rubies with a crisp, distinct star are especially prized.

Tourmaline

Colour: One of the most colourful gemstone families, tourmalines are found in pink, green, blue, purple and even watermelon (a pink centre with green edges).

Hardness: 7–7.5 on the Mohs scale, making them durable and well suited to everyday jewellery.

Value: Rarer shades, such as vivid green (chrome tourmaline) and blue-green (Paraiba), command higher prices, though tourmaline generally offers excellent value.

Interesting facts: A single tourmaline crystal can contain two or more colours, a feature prized in bi-colour and watermelon stones. Paraiba tourmalines, coloured by traces of copper, produce an intense neon blue-green unlike any other gemstone, and can rival rubies or emeralds in value.

Aquamarine

Colour: Known for its clear, pale blue tones, sometimes with a hint of green or teal.

Hardness: 7.5–8 on the Mohs scale, making it a durable choice for rings and everyday wear.

Value: Larger, clearer stones with strong blue saturation are the most valuable, though aquamarine is generally more accessible than sapphire or emerald.

Interesting facts: Aquamarine belongs to the beryl family, the same mineral group as emerald. Crystals can grow to remarkable sizes – the largest on record, found in Brazil in 1910, weighed over 110kg!

Peridot

Colour: Known for its fresh green hues, ranging from yellow-green and olive to vibrant lime green.

Hardness: 6.5–7 on the Mohs scale, so it’s best suited to earrings, pendants and rings with protective settings (or rings that don’t need to be worn daily).

Value: Offers excellent value, with larger, more vivid stones commanding higher prices.

Interesting facts: Peridot is one of the few gemstones formed in the Earth’s mantle rather than its crust, and has even been found in meteorites. In 2005, peridot was identified in comet dust returned by NASA’s Stardust probe.

Find Your Perfect Gemstone

Whether you’re drawn to the rich blue of a sapphire, the vivid green of an emerald or the fiery red of a ruby, we can help you select the perfect gemstone for your jewellery.

Every gemstone is individually sourced for its beauty, quality and character, and our experienced goldsmiths can create a bespoke piece designed specifically around your chosen stone.

Visit us in-store or book an appointment to explore our collection and discover the remarkable world of natural coloured gemstones.

Padparadscha sapphires

The Padparadscha is a special variety of sapphire. The sapphire is a corundum crystal, and comes in all shades of the rainbow. Only two have been awarded their own special name though – the very rare red sapphire, which is called a ruby, and the also very rare orange-pink sapphire, named the padparadscha.

A true padparadscah sapphire is hard to find, as the definition of its colour is tightly defined as a delicate pinkish orange. The word ‘padparadscha’ is derived from the Singhalese word ‘padmaraga’, used to describe the unique colour of the lotus flower.

The gemstone is neither pink, nor orange, but a glorious combination of the two, reminiscent of a an unforgettable sunset.

Due to its rarity, Padparadscha is one of the world‘s most expensive gems, with prices similar to those fetched by fine rubies or emeralds.

The original locality for padparadscha sapphires is Sri Lanka and many gem collectors believe the term should be restricted only to stones from this location. However, fine stones have also been found in Vietnam’s Quy Chau district, Tanzania’s Tunduru district, and Madagascar.

We love working with the rare and beautiful and this glorious gemstone is one of our favourites.

bespoke orange padparadscha pink sapphire

The birthstone for September is the sapphire

The birthstone for September is the sapphire.

Over the millennia the sapphire has come to symbolise honour, sincerity and faithfulness and has for centuries been associated with royalty and romance. Just think of the buzz that surrounded the engagement ring chosen for Diana by Charles, the Prince of Wales, in 1981 and then again when Prince William presented the same ring to his true love, Kate.

In ancient times it was believed that that blue sapphires protected their owners from envy and harm, making it very popular with rulers and despots of all kinds: rather a lot of those same rulers were assassinated over the years however, so it’s unlikely the blue gemstone was much use other than decorative. Unless the assassin was wearing a ruby of course, to bring success in his career… I digress, back to the birthstone for September, the sapphire!

The sapphire has always been associated with the colour blue and indeed its name comes from the Greek word sappheiros, which probably actually referred to the blue gemstone lapis lazuli. However, quite delightfully, sapphires come in many, many colours.

Sapphires, in all their shades, form the corundum family. As well as the blue sapphire we all know so well, they come in pink, violet, lilac, green, yellow, orange, purple and even grey, black, or brown.

When is a sapphire not a sapphire?

One colour you won’t find in a sapphire however is red – as the red corundum stone is called a ruby, and is the rarest colour of all. Ooh – those rubies again! Maybe in the world of gemstone mystical powers ruby trumps sapphire…

Another sapphire has been given the honour of its own name too, the simply gorgeous padparadscha sapphire. This means ‘lotus flower’ in Sinhalese, the language spoken in Sri Lanka, where these beautiful stones were first found. Their pinky-orange colour is impossible to describe in mere words, but trust us when we say it’s unforgettably beautiful.

As well as being the birthstone for September, the sapphire is of course the gemstone chosen to celebrate the 45^th wedding anniversary.

Bespoke sapphire jewellery

We love working with sapphires here at Christopher Evans and have created some breathtaking pieces over the years. As well as the rings you see here, we’ve worked on countless engagement rings, brooches, earrings and pendants.

We even designed and crafted a stunning brooch using multiple sapphires in varied shades of lilac, pink and green – an Elephant Hawk Moth, for a lovely lady who just adored this colourful creature.

To learn more about this beautiful gemstone, and how we can create the perfect piece for you, call in or call us!

birthstone padparadscha sapphire September

The fabulous Cartier

Jewellery designs by Cartier still cast the same spell over us as they have since the house of Cartier was formed in 1847.

Suppliers of fine jewellery to the rich, titled, royal, famous and infamous since they first opened their doors, Cartier has an illustrious history that includes inventing the wristwatch, supplying bespoke jewellery to all the royal houses of Europe, being the first to use the Art Deco style in jewellery, going head to head with Fabergé in the court of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and creating their own Cartier Imperial Egg and generally dazzling the world with the innovative and creative jewellery and watch designs ever since.

The invention of the wristwatch came about when, in 1904, the Brazilian pioneer aviator, Alberto Santos-Dumont complained to his friend, Louis Cartier of the unreliability and impracticality of using pocket watches while flying. Cartier designed a flat wristwatch with a distinctive square bezel and so the ‘Santos’ was born. By1907 Cartier had branches in London, New York and St. Petersburg and was quickly becoming one of the most successful watch companies in the world. The Baignoire and Tortue models (both of which are still in production today) were introduced in 1912, followed by the Tank model in 1917. This, also designed by Louis Cartier, was inspired from the newly introduced tanks on the Western Front. This line too has survived, with over thirty varieties made since.

Cartier are perhaps most famous however for their incredible jewellery, particularly the ‘Bestiary’ collection – best illustrated by the Panthère brooch of the 1940s created for Wallis Simpson.

Today, Cartier continues to reflect its heritage in the current Panthère collections and although they no longer have the dramatic impact of their ground-breaking predecessors, these pieces are quite breathtaking in their own right.

What Cartier has done since inception is provide the opportunity for women with the desire to stand out from the crowd to purchase, or have made bespoke, stand-out jewellery. Always ahead of the curve, Cartier is synonymous with style, elegance and sheer, unadulterated beauty,

bespoke diamonds jewellery design sapphire

A list of birthstones in the UK

Every month has its own stone, precious or semi-precious, that by ancient wisdom give an indication of the wearer’s personality.

Our goldsmiths, working from our stores in Cheshire, have created some fabulous bespoke pieces using birthstones and you don’t need to spend a fortune to create something truly unique that will be treasured forever.

Many of the stones listed here actually occur naturally in a dazzling rainbow of different colours, so if your birth month is September, but a blue sapphire just doesn’t appeal – choose one in pink, or orange, or green!

Each stone is also, according to ancient belief, imbued with mystical powers that transfer to its wearer, so, whether or not the Aquamarine is your birthstone, by wearing it you are channelling its ability to boost your happiness and courage. Load of nonsense? Bit of fun? Whatever…it’s still a lovely stone.

Whatever your colour preference and whatever your budget, our goldsmiths can design and create the perfect piece of jewellery for you, just ask!

So, what’s your stone?

January: Garnet, faith and loyalty

February: Amethyst, sincerity and wittiness

March: Aquamarine, happiness and courage

April: Diamond or Rock Crystal, eternity and love

May: Emerald or Chrysophase, fidelity and fertility

June: Pearl or Moonstone, purity and nobility

July: Ruby or Carnelian, strength and beauty

August: Peridot or Sardonyx, protection and success

September: Sapphire or Lapis Lazuli, serenity and wisdom

October: Opal, hope and creativity

November: Topaz or Citrine, friendship and healing

December: Tanzanite or Turquoise, trust and luck

aquamarine bespoke birthstone cheshire citrine diamond emerald lapis lazuli moonstone opal peridot ruby sapphire topaz