Cutting Quality and Ceylon Sapphires

On each of my Sri Lankan buying trips I go with good intentions to purchase poorly-cut sapphires for recutting, yet it's becoming more and more difficult to find stones with a combination of poor cutting and top color. Sri Lanka has a long history of cutting, and while some stones are still cut on traditional hand-powered machines, most are now cut using modern precision machines. I'm often impressed with the innovative designs and cutting quality seen in the gem markets. As a cutter myself I appreciate that there's a consideration for the extreme rarity of clean facet-grade rough, meaning that they are cut for brilliance as well as weight retention. It is definitely possible to do both!