This was one of my favorite rings that I made for the show case. I started with a really cool sea foam stone that I had to buy it when I saw it. It was a green beryl. As a side note, aquamarine, morganite and emerald are also in the beryl family. Even though this stone is green, it does not have the same mineral makeup of emerald to call it emerald. Pure beryl is clear, it is the “impurities” of additional chemicals that give it it’s different colors.
I made it in a three piece casting so I could really polish up the inside places before assembling it. I wanted to have the prongs more of a design element then just the function of securing the stone. The down side is trying to move the thick prongs to tighten the stone. We also made in it super white gold alloy that is considerably harder then yellow gold or typical white gold alloys. Since it was an expensive stone that is not very tough (7.5 MOHs scale) and it tends to cleve, I said a prayer before hammering the prongs down on the stone. Pliers were not going to move these beefy prongs.
Atlas Jewelers Bench Talk 