As long as I have been in the jewelry business (and that is a long time) Tom Chatham and his family have been making beautiful 'synthetic' gems. Rubies, sapphires and emeralds, and multiple other gems, are all made out of the same raw materials which are used by the earth to birth the natural ones. The difference is, these are man assisted. Not fakes, or imitations, the real gem, just not retrieved from the wild. No one gets bribed or forced to mine in horrible condition

A portrait of Mrs. Maisie Plant wearing the most rare and expensive jewels sold by Cartier in 1916. A double strand of exquisitely matched South Sea natural pearls. This portrait painted by Claudia Munro Kerr, is based on the original by Alphonse Junger and hangs in Cartier on 52nd Street in NYC. There are still some iconic architectural landmarks in New York City that resisted the fury of skyscrapers that make the famous outline of this US metropole and this article focuse