Gem Silica (Quartz / Chalcedony with Chrysocolla inclusions)

The Lily Mine has been a source of some beautiful rough Quartz / Opal / Chalcedony material that has been the focus of many faceters and lapidaries over the last 20+ years. A friend of ours brought this one back from Peru and we had to snag it as the patterning was too good to pass up. This material is often sold as Gem Silica which is essentially Quartz (or in this case Chalcedony) which has inclusions of the copper silicate Chrysocolla.

What's most interesting about this stone is that each band has its own distinct color. The topmost band is slightly more green than the bottom band which is a bit more blue, but if you rotate the stone in different lighting, the bands will actually shift in color and sometimes will show nearly identical coloring. The bands are divided by a well-balanced white / colorless Chalcedony section in the middle that didn't receive any of the Chrysocolla inclusions to create this eye-catching stone.

If you collect Quartz, inclusion gems or naturally multi-colored stones, don't miss out on this one as it's certainly the most interesting and alluring example we've seen from this mine.

Item # GEMSILPERU1367