Alexandrite Fun Fact

While Alexandrites found favor in the jewelry salons of St. Petersburg, Russia and Paris, France, it was America’s Tiffany Company that seems to have done the most to popularize the gem. George Kunz, Tiffany’s master gem buyer, fell absolutely in love with the gem and traveled to Russia in search of it. No one knows exactly how much of the gemstone he bought, but Tiffany had reserves so large, that it cornered the market on the stone for decades. For much of the 20th Century, there were no new discoveries of the mineral, and so it became very rare. Then in 1987, a new find was made at Hematita, Minas Gerais, Brazil. In 1993, there was another major find on the border of Tanzania and Mozambique.