Green Amber Jewelry - The mystery behind green amber

I know that most of you amber jewelery or amber jewellery ( if you are in the UK) afficionados are familiar with green amber. It has fascinated jewelry collectors for years, but did you know that this beautifully hued amber stone does not exist in nature?!! Well, not really anyway. There is a naturally occuring amber which is called "green" but it looks nothing like what you see when purchasing "green amber". The natural color falls under the category of - earth amber. Here is an excerpt from amber.com.pl describing the naturally occuring "green amber"

"The earth amber group of varieties with foreign substances of plant origin include: dappled amber, in which small grey or black pieces of plant detritus appear against a yellow or white background, transparent earth amber, which contains fragments of detritus and isolated large gas bubbles which are perfectly visible against its transparent yellow-brown background, green amber and mixed earth amber, where there are fragments of opaque yellow amber and amber with isolated plant impurities."

Still, 99.9% of what you will come across when perusing amber collections will be a jeweler's enhancement of the natural stone. The beautiful bright color you find is a result of a movement in the amber industry in Gdansk to create something new and exciting. The most common process through which the green amber color is achieved is by applying a backing to the gemstone, a type of paste and heating it to bind. The exact methods are highly guarded by jewelers.