A Montana Sapphire Q&A With Misfit Diamonds

Montana Sapphires are an American-mined stone that stands out among all the stunning shades of blue. These gemstones are most often found in soft hues of blue, green, and teal, and they lend an effortless, casual feel to sapphire jewelry. We get ours from Misfit Diamonds, a stone wholesaler focused on ethical sourcing, and to learn more about Montana sapphires, their color, sourcing, and rarity, we sat down with Misfit's Cecilia Rahn.

Can you tell us a little bit about Misfit Diamonds, and why you love Montana sapphires? 

We are a B2B wholesaler within the jewelry industry that specializes in unique and unusual natural diamonds and sapphires, embracing traditional industry cast-offs for their natural beauty.

What makes these sapphires unique? 

Traditionally, sapphires are graded by clarity and uniform coloring. Misfit likes to embrace that each stone is one-of-a-kind with its own unique color, imperfection, silkiness and character.

What is the difference between an unheated and heated Montana sapphire? Heated sapphires undergo a process of being slowly heated then cooled. The heating eliminates smaller crystal inclusions improving stone clarity and can also brighten the typically softer tones of Montana sapphires to appear more vibrant. Unheated Montana sapphires tend to be more silky and pale; pulled from the earth and cut and polished as is.

Many people are curious about the range in pricing for Montana sapphires, as the rarity of certain kinds of Montana sapphires isn't super broadly known — could you please expand on that?

Size is a major factor in Montana sapphire rarity, as only around 5% of rough yields a cut stone larger than 1ct. Unheated Montana sapphires with high clarity and/or vibrant colored stones that aren't heated are more rare, but can have a similar look to heated stones. Heat treatment is broadly accepted and does not make a stone better/worse, it's just something for us gem nerds to get excited about when seeing something extra rare!!

Are Montana sapphires sustainably mined? Can you tell us a little bit about the mines you work with? 

Our Montana Sapphire collections are out of Missouri River and Rock Creek. Miners make a conscious effort to return dig sites to their pre-mining state. At the close of the mining season, dig sites are filled with earth and covered with fine material accumulated from the bottom of the pond and then seeded with local plants and grass.

On that note, can you elaborate a bit more on Misfit's work to help foster a more transparent supply chain/traceable origin?

Our main pillar and goal here is to be transparent. By investing our resources towards products with mine-to-market documentation, we can leverage our buying power to increase transparency in our supply chain and help foster positive change within it. Misfit is a pretty small fish in a very big pond, so we want to show that if we're able to provide this traceability, everyone in our industry can too!

What is your favorite Montana sapphire in your inventory currently? Even though I don't lean toward pear shapes usually, this big beauty has my heart!