Rough and facetted Tsavorites, seen at Intergem 2020, Idar-Oberstein

Seen at Intergem 2020, between two corona lock-downs, those beautiful rough and polished tsavorites just simply got my jar to drop.

Tsavorite is part of the very complex garnet group and garnet does hold a special place in my heart. You see, garnet is often taken for granted and unappreciated as a lot of people still associate it to the more common and affordable dark red to purple stone. But in reality, garnet is a fascinating group that withholds an even more fascinating chemistry. Indeed, garnet possesses different species in its very own group. Even-though those species have similar physical properties and crystal form, they do however alter in their chemical composition.

Tsavorite is the green variety of grossular garnet. Unlike red garnet, for which references go back as early as ancient Egypt, tsavorite got discovered much later, in the second half of the 20th century. It was in 1967 to be exact, that Scottish geologist Campbell Bridges first stumbled upon this intriguing new gem in northeast Tanzania, along the Lelatema fault system. A couple of years later, Bridges discovered a new deposit in Kenya, just next to the famous Tsavo National Park. In 1974, this ravishing green stone got introduced to the US market through a very clever marketing campaign. After Kunzite (1902), Morganite (1910) and Tanzanite (1960’s), it is this newly discovered attractive green garnet that received all the attention from world famous brand Tiffany & Co. After careful consideration, Henri B. Platt, then president of the brand, decided to name the gem after the Tsavo National Park, one of Africa’s largest wildlife parks. It turns out, that today tsavorite is one of the few remaining « honest » gemstone which is not commonly treated - remaining natural, untouched and « wild » like the wild animals in the Tsavo park. Most certainly a visionary call!

Mélanie Matthes
2021-05-13