With this post I start my daily articles about Munich Show. For the moment not too much to say, we are just starting our trip. I can say that us we will have a large amount of stuff with exceptional classic specimens coming from a great collection that we just bought and that we will exhibit for the first time in Munich and Expominer (Barcelona Show).

As a novelty, we bring also an important lot of colorful stalactitic Goethites from Tharsis (Huelva, Spain) mined between May and October 2007. If I have the chance to do it, I will publish a photo of one of them tomorrow.

BTW, we have not heard much about new novelties but it doesn't mean that they don't exist. We will see during next few days.

Wednesday 31 October 2007

The majority of the stand are already set up and we have survived with Parés absent. With this message I publish two photos, the first one is the start of the set-up and the second one is with the stand close to ready. We can see Carme, Julia, J. Gil and J.R. Garcia helping. Thanks to everybody.

We publish two videos of the Halls 5 and 4. The Hall 5 is the main one and where the best specimens are (as well as ourselves). The Hall 4 is more diverse, with all kind of stuff and with the majority of Chinese and Moroccan dealers.

We saw several novelties at the Show today. For the moment we can points out few nice Herderites from Sassi, a new locality in Pakistan, and a recent small find of beautiful pink octahedral Fluorites from Nagar, Pakistan.

The start of set-up

Thursday 1 November 2007

The show is now open, waiting for the arrival of the customers tomorrow. Although I was very busy over the past few days setting up our booth, I found time to try to check the Show's main novelties. The more noticeable new find seems to be the Apatites (Fluor? Hydroxyl?) from Sapo Mine, Goiabeira, Aimorés, Minas Gerais, Brazil, that it is the same locality were the Hydroxylapatites with unusual shape came out over the past years.
The new ones are totally different: either in elongated groups of crystals growing on steps, or very similar to the Panasqueira ones but on white Albite matrix. People talk a lot about them, due to their esthetics as well as for their high price.

More novelties: in Zambia new Rutiles, really peculiar, pseudormophosing Ilmenite? Hematite?, and in Madagascar, new Corundum-Rubies, very red and partially gemmy. Also the new Eudidymites, Epidymites and Niobophyllites from Malawi, brought for us, are mentioned frequently as an important novelty.

I have more things to comment, but honestly, I'm so tired that I need to do it over the next days.

This evening when I had a fast meal in a small cafe in Feldkirchen, I met there, by chance, Alí Hmani and his son. Alí is a Moroccan dealer and we have been friends for more than 20 years. We had a lot of fun talking about the Show histories. I have published the photo of both of them as a warm souvenir of our common experiences in Morocco.

Ali Hmani and his son

The second photo shows John S. White and Bill & Carol Smith, having a peaceful chat inside my booth. Bill & Carol Smith are great US collectors as well as organizers of the Denver Main Show.

John S. White with Bill & Carol Smith in my booth

Monday 5 November 2007

OK, yesterday we finished the show and now we are heading back to Barcelona with our mind focused on the next Expominer Show that will start this Friday.

Yesterday Sunday was my first "free day" and I used it to visit the Show. The exhibit of the Himalayan minerals this year was excellent, in my opinion. I did a video of the general exhibit already published together with this message, and some photos and videos about the specimens that I liked most of this exhibit and that I will publish over the next few days together with the final summary of the Show.

Munich Show (Mineralientage) 2007- General exhibit

Tuesday 6 November 2007

Here you have videos of 4 specimens that I specially liked on the Himalayas expo of Munich 2007.

Sunday 11 November 2007

During a small break at the Expominer Show (the Barcelona mineral show) I have a chance to write about my personal point of view of the past Munich Show.

On previous posts I have already commented on some of the novelties that I found there. To my previous comments, I would just add that for me the major novelty was the Fluor? / Hydroxyl? Apatite from the Sapo Mine, Brazil, and that to this we should add the iridescent Goethite from Tharsis, Huelva, Spain; the Epididymite, Eudidymite and Niobophyllite from Mont Malosa, Malawi; the dichroic ruby-sapphire (Corundum) from the Zazafotsy quarry (Madagascar); the Ilmenite? - Hematite? pseudomorphed by Rutile from Zambia; the (numerous) Brazilianites from Corrego Frio, Brazil; the Herderites from Sassi, Pakistan; the new octahedral pink Fluorite also from Pakistan, the Topaz from the China-Vietnam border and bicolored Tourmalines on Quartz matrix from China.

So, as usual in past years, not too many novelties, but a lot of great samples coming from collections recently sold.

I catched John Veevaert with a marriage of German collectors on my stand

Talking about great samples, I return to a topic that I started in a previous message. Many people with whom I spoke share my concerns about the centrifugal force that apparently is separating more and more the regular collector and the wealthy collector, who is disposed to pay enormous amounts of money to get the so-called "trophy" "killer" or "world's best" specimens. This abyss that is opening during recent years I think will produce, even more so in the future, the perception by collectors that they can't continue collectioning at the quality level they wish at prices they can afford. If this threat continues then the unfortunate future of shows could be just deals between dealers and a rush for "trophy" specimens with a corresponding escalation of prices that this phenomena would cause.

I believe that is very important to take care of the small budget collector, as well as kids with just 10-15 Euros in their pockets, and that we should try not to drive them away. It would be sad if they did not have a chance to buy from small scrupulous dealers because the larger and well-known dealers offer just extremely expensive rocks. I believe that we should tend bridges between both extremes and if we can do that, the general health of the mineral hobby will increase.

Otherwise, Munich has been, as in every year, a huge mineralogical celebration where the senses have been filled (by experiences) and the pockets have been drained (of money). The Munich Show is an essential appointment in order to know what happens in the collector's world. It is not the end of the world if we don't get there, but without doubt, to visit it reinforces our knowledge of mineralogy and it allows us to better understand the real situation of the prices in the mineral market.

Jordi

Aufwiedersehn...