Mar 20, 2013 | Designing Eye, News & Press
Each February, the gem and jewelry industry gathers in the Tucson desert for a gala dinner banquet sponsored by the American Gem Trade Association. It honors the winners of the AGTA Spectrum Awards, the industry’s most sought-after awards for designers of...
Mar 5, 2013 | News & Press
Cynthia was recently interviewed in January by Accomplished Minds – check out the video below or watch it on their site! To see more of Cynthia’s custom jewelry design work,...
Jan 30, 2013 | Designing Eye
The Great Horned Owl, magnificent to behold, fearsome to its prey, embodies both the majesty and menace of nature. The heavily built, barrel-shaped species boasts penetrating eyes with vivid yellow irises, and tufts of feathers on its head that look like horns, or...
Dec 20, 2012 | Designing Eye
When Cynthia Renee saw an antique Japanese candle lamp on a journey of relaxation and contemplation at the Golden Door Spa in southern California, she knew she had found an image around which to design a jewel. The peace-filled imagery of candlelight spoke to the...
Dec 11, 2012 | Designing Eye
Cynthia Renee has visited Spain many times over the years to stay with her brother, who maintains a home in the ancient country. From her first visit, her designer’s heart was captivated by the Moorish design motifs she saw in the great medieval cities. Art and...
Nov 19, 2012 | Colored Gems
In the 1500s in Tudor London, a Latin expression — rara avis — became popular. Literally meaning “rare bird” — the expression was gleaned from a phrase by the Roman poet Juvenal, “rara avis in terries nigroque simillima cygno”, or “a rare bird in the...
Nov 13, 2012 | Designing Eye
Mosaic is the art of creating images and patterns using tesserae, small pieces of glass, stone or other colorful materials. An ancient decorative skill, mosaics have been assembled since the second half of the third millennium BC, in Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome and...
Nov 5, 2012 | Colored Gems
When a strange, orangy-pinkish-reddish garnet was discovered in the mid-1960s, in the Umba Valley of Tanzania, locals and experienced gemologists didn’t know what to make of it. The odd stone was often tossed in with parcels of sought-after rhodolite garnets,...
Oct 22, 2012 | Colored Gems, Designing Eye
“Blackberry winter” – a farmer’s expression familiar to country folk – evokes a day in late spring when one wakes up to a cold snap. Though the chill seems to threaten the season’s delicate fruit blossoms and tender seedlings, they...
May 28, 2011 | Colored Gems, Designing Eye, Once Upon A Jewel
Proud of his bounty, a gem collector came to me with a wonderful assortment of rare Demantoid garnets he had been gathering. Demantoid garnets, primarily mined in Russia and Namibia, behave in light similarly to diamonds and appear fiery. They are rare, beautiful and...
