Labradorite magic

My new favorite stone... as you might have guessed from all the shiny featured happening on this blog lately, labradorite!
I just love the flashes and the versatility of this stone.
Check out these amazing items:

All you wanted to know about Malachite

Text and photos: Sandra Kemppainen, wikipedia.com

Malachite is a copper carbonate hydroxide mineral. This opaque, green banded mineral crystallizes in the monoclinic crystal system, and most often forms botryoidal, fibrous, or stalagmitic masses, in fractures and spaces, deep underground, where the water table and hydrothermal fluids provide the means for chemical precipitation. Individual crystals are rare but do occur as slender to acicular prisms. Typical malachite is laminated and whether or not microbes intervene in its formation is unknown.

Malachite was used as a mineral pigment in green paints from antiquity until about 1800. The pigment is moderately lightfast, very sensitive to acids, and varying in color. The natural form was being replaced by its synthetic form, verditer, among other synthetic greens. It is also used for decorative purposes, such as in the Malachite Room in the Hermitage, which features a huge malachite vase (see right), and the Malachite Room in Castillo de Chapultepec in Mexico City.

Malachite is named after Greek word for “mallow” because of its resemblance to the leaves of the Mallow plant. It is a green, very common secondary copper mineral with a widely variable habit. Malachite shows a banding of light and dark layers with concentric rings, straight stripes and other figurative shapes caused by its shell-like formation. 

Malachite was popular in ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome and was used for jewelry, amulets, as a powder for eye shadow and colouring pigment. Nowadays it is popular for jewelry and ornaments.

Malachite dust is toxic and must not be inhaled during cutting and polishing.

Malachite, with its beautiful, rich green color, leaves no doubt of its importance as a jewel. Its opaque strength and power demands respect, mesmerizing the viewer. Yet the movement, flow and energy in its lines, circles and designs soothe and welcome. It is spiritually inviting.

Malachite personifies the deep healing green of nature and represents the innate beauty of flowers, trees, roots and plants. It is a Stone of Transformation, assisting one in changing situations and providing for spiritual growth. It heals on physical and emotional levels, drawing out impurities and stimulating the Life Force throughout the aura and body. 

Inherent in Malachite is lighter green eye-shaped forms or bands on its surface. These “eye stones,” believed to enhance great visionary powers, were used to ward off negative happenings. They were stones of security and protection for children, and their most remarkable association today is the ability to warn of impending danger by breaking into pieces.

Malachite is a protection stone, absorbing negative energies and pollutants from the atmosphere and from the body. It guards against radiation of all kinds, clears electromagnetic pollution and heals earth energies. Keep near microwaves in the kitchen and televisions in living areas. In the workplace Malachite protects against noise, over-bright fluorescent lighting, and harmful rays from technological equipment, negative phone calls and emails.

Sandra Kemppainen.

All you wanted to know about Chrysocolla

Text: Sandra Kemppainen, shimmerlings.com; 

photo: wikipedia, A close-up photograph of a specimen of Chrysocolla from Australia. 

Author: Lloyd.james0615

One of the less known stones quite commonly used in jewellery making is Chrysocolla.

Quite often confused with turquoise, it has many of the same visual qualities as turquoise. But it is nothing like turquoise.

In ancient Egypt, it was called the ‘wise stone’ as those who wore it generally came up with clever comprises when it seems and unbearable pass in negotiations. It was also thought it would protect the wearer against psychological damage as well. It is also told that this stone had the power to make more violent people more sensitive and tolerant, which is apparently why Cleopatra carried chrysocolla with her everywhere she went.

Scientific Properties:

Mohs Hardness of 2 with a monoclinic crystal structure.

Chrysocolla gemstone generally occurs as a bright green or bluish crust or as compact grapelike clusters of stone. It is a copper bearing mineral found wherever copper deposits occur especially in areas of the southwestern USA, Chili, Zaire, Australia, France and England. Eliat Stone is a variegated blue and green mixture of chrysocolla and other copper minerals found in the Gulf of Aqaba, near the northwestern end of the Red Sea”.

Pure chrysocolla is generally too soft for main line jewelry purposes although, beads can be created with it, as well, it is often found in quartz deposits which makes the chrysocolla hard enough to polish for cabochons and other products. It is often found mixed with malachite, turquoise and azurite, which creates a wonderful product called Eilat Stone (a gem associated with King Soloman’s Mines) as well as bringing the metaphysical qualities of each of those gemstone into play as well.

Mystical Properties:

Chrysocolla is generally associated with peace and tranquility, as well as intuition, patience and unconditional love. It is often thought to offer gentle and soothing qualities, it is believed to be a powerful source of life-force energy, as well as a stone for feminine empowerment; helping to build feminine energies and cam emotions. 

Chrysocolla helps to clear the subconscious of negative feelings of guilt, fears and tension, and bringing up inner strength. It aids in releasing old resentment and in forgiving people you’ve been holding resistance to. It is exceptionally helpful in dealing with the anger and pain associated with rape, or abuse of any kind.

This is a stone that is excellent for reading layouts or for jewelry, psychic impressions suggest that this stone is a master healer, through emotion expression. It is told to be quite useful to one for expressing those emotions which are fire based, such as anger, fear, passion or excitement. Chrysocolla has been known to raise the metabolism to assist in rectifying an imbalance or to help in losing weight.

Chrysocolla is known to promote level headedness, encouraging clarity of thought and a neutral, calm attitude during turbulence. It can also be used to decrease nervousness and irritability.

Healing Properties:

Chrysocolla is best known among Native American Indian cultures for its capability of strengthening the body’s resistance and bringing about calm feeling where there has been upset and turmoil. It enhances creativity in all, female energy and communication, as well as relieving ulcers and arthritis.

This stone can be placed directly on the effected body position, for alleviating cramps, infections of the throat, detoxifying the liver, lowering blood pressure (heart) or assisting recovery from burns. As well, laying it on the third eye offers immense spiritual benefit.

Chrysocolla is particularly effective when carried as a touchstone or jewelry that is in constant contact with the skin. It should be cleansed once a month under warm running water and then recharged overnight in a bowl with tumbled hematite.

Magical Properties:

Chrysocolla makes a bridge of energy between the Earth and the Sky, the physical and the spiritual planes. A stone with very feminine energies, chrysocolla ease the mental and emotional pains of any troubled relationship by relieving tension and bringing out your inner strengths.

When attempting to remove yourself from a troublesome or even dangerous relationship or situation, especially those filled with emtional tension, draw a nine inch circle on a piece of paper. Set a peice of chrysocolla in the center of the circle, sit and meditate on what this situation is costing you in manners of self-esteem, physical danger, emotional stress and psychological duress, as well as monetarily. Force yourself to see it for it’s full and true ugliness....no excuses!

Do this for nine nights, each time moving the stone closer and closer to the edge of the circle. In the meantime, take whatever measures are appropriate and necessary for you to be safe. By the end of the ninth night, you should be able to remove the stone completely from the circle.

If however, you have procrastinated, and taken to steps to physically help remove yourself from this situation, moving the stone to the edge of the circle will not gain you freedom from the problem. You may start again, but you should consider why you were unable to do it the first time, before beginning again.

All you wanted to know about: Lapis Lazuli

Found in artifacts dating to the predynastic Naqada II (3500-3100 BC) time period throughout the rest of ancient Egypt’s long history, lapis lazuli appears to have been one of the most popular gem stones in the ancient culture. 

In the Epic of Gilgamesh; the oldest known story in human history, lapis lazuli is referenced several times. Lapis jewelry has been found at excavations of the Predynastic Egyptian site Naqada (3300–3100 BC), and powdered lapis was used as eyeshadow by Cleopatra.

Known as KHESBED, the stone was used in jewelry, in effigies, in amulets, and even in medicines.

Lapis is a deep blue stone, reflecting both the life-giving waters of the Nile and the divine expanse of the sky. Associated with the sky goddess, Nut, the goddess of balance and truth, Ma’at, and the sun god, Re, lapis was highly sought after in ancient Egypt. 

Egyptian cultures made a practice of burying a lapis lazuli scarab with their dead, and believed it to offer protection. The very earliest cultures valued lapis lazuli more highly than gold. Greeks spoke of an ancient sapphire which was included with gold, and this was unmistakably lapis. Some believed that dreaming of lapis would foretell love that would be forever faithful.

Healing properties of Lapis Lazuli

Lapis Lazuli is used with other stones when parts of the body need to be purified and cleansed and should be only used by a healer. Lapis Lazuli has high intensity and can open many of the chakra centers. This must be done only with love in the heart and comprehension in the mind and wisdom in soul.

Lapis lazuli is regarded by many people around the world as the stone of friendship and truth. The blue stone is said to encourage harmony in relationships and help its wearer to be authentic and give his or her opinion openly.

Lapis lazuli is a rock, largely formed from the mineral lazurite.

The main component of lapis lazuli is lazurite (25% to 40%), a feldspathoid silicate mineral with the formula. Most lapis lazuli also contains calcite (white), sodalite (blue), and pyrite (metallic yellow). 

Lapis lazuli is an opaque rock that mainly consists of diopside and lazurite. It came into being millions of years ago during the metamorphosis of lime to marble. Uncut, lapis lazuli is matt and of a deep, dark blue colour, often with golden inclusions and whitish marble veins. The small inclusions with their golden shimmer, which give the stone the magic of a starry sky, are not of gold as people used to think, but of pyrites. Their cause is iron. The blue colour comes from the sulphur content of the lazurite and may range from pure ultramarine to a lighter blue. At between 5 and 6 on the Mohs scale, this stone is among the less hard gemstones.

When the cutter turns up his nose ...

Many a cutter ‘turns up his nose’ when cutting lapis lazuli, for as soon as the stone comes into contact with the cutting-disc it gives off a typical smell. An experienced cutter can even tell from the odour how intense the colour is. When polishing this stone, he must handle it gently on account of its modest hardness and not subject it to much pressure. But there is no need for the wearer to worry: a lapis lazuli that has grown matt from having been worn too much can easily be repolished at any time. Lapis lazuli is often sealed with colourless wax or synthetic resin. As long as these substances are not mixed with any colouring agent, this sealing process simply has the effect of improving the stone’s wearing qualities. Having said that, the stone should always be protected from acidic substances, and it should not be exposed to too much sunlight.

All you wanted to know about Spinel

 

Spinel is the great impostor of gemstone history: many famous rubies in crown jewels around the world are actually spinel.

In Burma , where some of the most beautiful colors are mined, spinel was recognised as a separate gem species since 1600 but in other countries the masquerade continued for hundreds of years. Historically, fine red spinels were esteemed as much as ruby, and sometimes even more. 

Next to ruby and the rare red diamond, spinel is the most expensive of all red gems. Spinels were most often referred to as “balast rubies” which may have referred to colour or to country of origin.

The most famous is the Black Prince’s Ruby, a magnificent 170-carat red spinel that currently adorns the Imperial State Crown in the British Crown Jewels after a long history: Henry V even wore it on his battle helmet! The Timur Ruby, a 352-carat red spinel now owned by Queen Elizabeth, has the names of the Mughal emperors who previously owned it engraved on its face, an undeniable pedigree!

With a hardness of 8 and no cleavage planes, spinel is a tough and durable gemstone suitable for any kind of jewellery. 

Its’ lustre is vitreous and rough crystals can be transparent, translucent or nearly opaque. A member of the isometric system, the octahedron is the typical habit. Dodecahedrons and combinations of other isometric forms are also common. Many crystals are twinned on the plane of the octahedral face forming flattened triangular forms known as “spinel twins”.

Today, spinel is a favourite of gem dealers and gem collectors due to its brilliance, hardness and wide range of spectacular colours. Vivid traffic light red and cobalt blue are the most expensive colours for spinel and nice stones over 3cts. in size are always a rarity.

Top quality red spinels display superb bright and saturated red colours that actually fluoresce, or glow, in natural light. Pure colourless natural spinel is extremely rare and natural white spinels always show a trace of pink. Star spinels are found occasionally and they may display either four or six rays depending on their orientation. Spinel also comes in beautiful blues which are sometimes called cobalt spinel, but these are very very rare.

Because spinels made in a laboratory are often used for imitation birthstone rings, many people think “synthetic” when they hear the name “spinel.” They have often never even seen the real thing.

In fact, the main thing holding back greater recognition for spinel is rarity. Fine spinels are now more rare than the rubies they used to imitate. Strangely, they are also more affordable: in the gem world, too rare can be a drawback because so few people even get a chance to grow to love these gem varieties.

In addition to Burma, now known as Myanmar, spinel is mined in Sri Lanka, Tanzania, and Tadjikstan, part of the former Soviet Union.

Spinel is a durable gemstone that is perfect for all jewellery uses. 

It is most often faceted in oval, round, or cushion shapes and is not currently found in calibrated sizes due to its rarity.

Precious spinels appear strikingly clean and free of inclusions. This impression is due among other things to the lack of liquid inclusions. 

The best proof of spinel is spinel and microscopic octahedra may be scattered in long chains and sinuous bands throughout inner stretches of the host crystal. Besides these mini spinels, spinel shelters a whole range of other guest minerals including albite, anhydrite, apatite, baddeleyite, calcite, olivine, and titanite.

Historically, fine red spinels were esteemed as much as ruby, and sometimes even more. Next to ruby and the rare red diamond, spinel is the most expensive of all red gems.

Sandra Kemppainen, wikipedia.

Birthstones – Gemstones that tell about you: August, September

For August, we have peridot and sardonyx, and for September we have two blue stones, sapphire and lapis lazuli.

August: Peridot, Sardonyx

Peridot is the gem variety of olivine. Peridot is the birthstone for August and the Zodiac stone for the constellation Libra (astrological sources refer to peridot as Chrysolite). Peridot is associated with the values of fame, dignity, protection, and success.

Peridotes are olive green gemstones. Peridotes are associated with love, faithfulness, loyalty and truth.

 Peridotes are believed to help with dignity, protection, openness, growth and fame. This gem is said to help with illness in lungs, sinuses and lymph.

Gem quality peridot comes from the ancient source of Zagbargad (Zebirget) Island in the Red Sea off the coast of Egypt; Mogok, Myanmar (formerly known as Burma); Kohistan, Pakistan; Minas Gerais, Brazil; Eifel, Germany; Chihuahua, Mexico; Ethiopia; Australia; Peridot Mesa, San Carlos Apache Reservation, Gila County, Arizona and Salt Lake Crater, Oahu, Hawaii, USA. The best quality peridot has historically come either from Myanmar or Egypt.

Sardonyx is a banded variety of chalcedony (cryptocrystalline quartz), with layers alternating between Sard and Onyx. It is an impure fine-grained quartz whose crystals are too small to see. The color is usually a yellow-brown alternating with white, but other variants are also called sardonyx.

The banded nature of sardonyx is used to advantage by lapidaries and artisans, as a careful selection of material and design allows the creation of bas-relief art, where one layer is left as a foreground, and another is used as the background for a carving.

Sardonyx is the traditional birthstone for August. It is associated with relaxation and security.

September: Sapphire, Lapis Lazuli

Sapphires are well known from such places as Sri Lanka and India, and excellent specimens are also found in Tanzania and the Kola Pennensula of Russia. In addition, sapphires are found in many places throughout the world, including North Carolina, Brazil, and China.

Sapphires are extremely durable (only diamond and moisannite are harder).  Artificial sapphire crystals are used are used as the crystal face in genuine Rolex watches, and they are extremely scratch resistant.

Sapphires are gems that come in various colors, including, white, pink and blue. Sapphires will bring truth, constancy and sincerity. Sapphires are believed to help with insight, interpretation and clairvoyance and sapphires banish bad thoughts. The healing properties that sapphires have are cancer, burns, hearing problems and they are said to lower fever.

Lapis Lazuli

Lazurite is a popular but generally expensive mineral. Well-formed, deep blue crystals are rare and valuable. It is more commonly found massive and combined with other minerals into a rock called Lapis Lazuli, which is an alternate birthstone for the month of September.

Lapis lazuli (often simply called lapis) is mostly lazurite but commonly contains pyrite and calcite and some other minerals. The name means “blue rock” and is always a brilliant blue with violet or greenish tints. The rich blue color is due to the sulfur that is inherent in the structure of lazurite. Small crystals of pyrite are always present in lapis and their brassy yellow color is both attractive and diagnostic in distinguishing lapis from its also blue cousin - sodalite rock, which lacks pyrite. The calcite produces white streaks in the lapis and too much calcite will lower the value of the stone.

Lapis lazuli has been mined for centuries from a locality still in use today in the remote mountain valley called Kokcha, Afghanistan. First mined 6000 years ago, the rock was transported to Egypt and present day Iraq and later to Europe where it was used in jewelry and for ornamental stone. Europeans even ground down the rock into an expensive powdered pigment for paints called “ultramarine”. Today ultramarine is manufactured artificially. Although no longer the only source of lapis, Afghanistan still produces the finest quality material.

Sandra Kemppainen, Susan Fred.

Gemstone Special: Arizona Wired Elegance

Ever since I joined Etsy, an enormous online community for buyers and sellers of handmade, vintage and supplies products, I have been browsing for beautiful items. That is how I came accross Arizona Wired Ekegance, an online shop with stunning handmade wirewrap jewelry. So I decided to interview its owners for Design Jewelry and Accessories magazine.

“Tell me about who you are, where you live, the location of your shop, workshop, who creates the jewelry.”

“My husband, Ryan DeWitt, and I created Wired Elegance two years ago. It’s been an amazing experience for us to share - one that is away from the daily grind of work and the hustle and bustle of raising young children. Located in Tucson, Arizona, my husband works as an electrical engineer by day and a jewelry artist by night! He comes from a very artistic family and has experimented with different mediums, but he found his niche in jewelry. He makes all of our wire wrapped pieces and is currently experimenting with other forms of jewelry making. Soon, we hope to add a few new types into our store! A former teacher, I now stay home with our three children. My days are filled with preschool, sports activities, and diapers. During nap times and night times, I create the chainmaille pieces in our store and maintain the business (customer relations, online store, taxes, etc.)

Our garage has been transformed into a full lapidary shop so that we have the ability to cut and polish cabochons. We have a silver-smithing workbench in our garage as well, where my husband is experimenting with textured silver and various other types of jewelry. Our chainmaille and wire wrapped pieces are created in our home. My husband has a set up in our den, out of reach from little hands. Each night he sits at the desk and listens to music as he creates beautiful pieces.

Currently, our jewelry is sold online as well as at art/craft shows in the Phoenix/Tucson area.”

 

“Do you have a favorite stone you work with?”

From Ryan DeWitt:

“I wouldn’t say that I have a particular type of stone to work with, but I do have a favorite shape that I enjoy. I really like the challenge of working with the bizarre, odd shapes. They provide me an escape from my standard patterns and force me to be more creative. I often have to think “outside the box” with these pieces and find that the finished products are quite rewarding in the end!”

“What do you feel influences your designs?”

Ryan DeWitt:

“I really believe ‘less is more’ when working with wire. I prefer simplistic

patterns that flow and highlight each stone. The stones themselves are beautiful. I use the wire to form organic, fluid movement in an attempt to highlight their beauty in an elegant way, not to detract from them. It’s hard to say what exactly influences my specific designs because it is more of a feeling than any particular attribute. When I look at a stone, I mentally develop different possible designs based on its size and features and then go from there. As I’m wrapping a piece, sometimes I’ll get inspired to try something new…sometimes this doesn’t work, and other times I am pleasantly surprised. My mistakes also guide my designs, and are often a blessing in disguise!

If I make a mistake, it forces me to brainstorm and be creative to find a solution. Truth be told, most of my designs are an indirect result of my mistakes!”

“Which is your favorite item ever created?”

Ryan: “I would have to say the Carved Amber Pendant is my favorite piece that I’ve done thus far. I had never wrapped a carved stone before and was a bit skeptical of the outcome. The shape of the stone and the design carved in the amber appealed to my creative nature. The finished result was stunning! It was so unexpected and completely different than anything I’d ever done.”

If we were to select a fellow jewelry designer as a ‘favorite’, it would be Scott McNeely from Maya Canyon. His work is exceptional. He has the same philosophy of ‘less is more’ and really lets the pieces speak for themselves. We have admired his work for years, and are able to stay in touch each February as he and his wife travel to Tucson for the Tucson Gem & Mineral Show.”

“What is your dream for your brand in the future?”

“We love to dream about the possibilities for Wired Elegance. We hope to grow as artists and explore creating different types of jewelry. If we are dreaming big, we’d also love to have someone from every country in the world wearing a piece of our jewelry! Knowing that something we have made is being worn by someone on the other side of the planet is an amazing feeling!"

"Who is your favorite designer and why?”

“My husband comes from a very artistic family. Their life-long work has definitely inspired him and influenced the way he views art of all mediums as well as in the way he designs his jewelry. If we were to choose a favorite artist, it would have to be a tie between his grandmother and aunt, Pat DeWitt and Wendy DeWitt. Their talent truly is amazing!”

“For years, we have always admired the various wire wrap artists that we have seen. We enjoy the chance to talk, share our common passion and truly appreciate all the effort and talent that goes into their work.

feeling. It’s definitely surreal! We also dream that one day, people will see our jewelry and recognize it, knowing that it came from us.”

“Ultimately, we’d love to continue finding success and growth in our store! We took my husband’s artistic hobby and his passion for minerals and were able to turn it into a business. It truly has been a remarkable journey and we are only at the beginning! We look forward to expanding and reaching new levels of success, whatever they may be!”

Arizona Wired Elegance online:

Website:

http://www.wiredelegance.com

Blog:

http://wiredelegance.com/we-blog.html

Etsy Shop:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/ArizonaWiredElegance

Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/WiredElegance

Twitter:

http://twitter.com/WiredElegance