Crystal & Gemstone Guide

If you only buy one crystal, make it amethyst. This gorgeous purple quartz ranges from pale lavender to deep royal violet, and it has been a go-to hea...

Rose quartz is the love stone, plain and simple. That soft pink color (ranging from nearly transparent to a milky rose) comes from trace amounts of ti...

Clear quartz is the Swiss Army knife of crystals. People call it the master healer for good reason: it amplifies the energy of other stones, it can be...

Citrine is liquid sunshine in crystal form. Its golden yellow to amber tones come from trace iron in the quartz structure, and it has long been celebr...

This is one of those stones that every collection needs. Black tourmaline (also called schorl) is hands down the most powerful protective stone out th...

Named after Selene, the Greek goddess of the moon, selenite looks like moonlight captured in stone. This crystallized form of gypsum is prized above a...

Fair warning: you will want to buy ten of these. Labradorite is a feldspar mineral that does something called labradorescence, where brilliant flashes...

Moonstone has this captivating optical glow called adularescence, a billowy light that glides across its surface like moonlight on water. Ancient Roma...

Tiger's eye has this silky, luminous band of light that rolls across its surface like the eye of a great cat. That effect (called chatoyancy) happens ...

Lapis lazuli is 6,000 years of human fascination in a single stone. That deep celestial blue, spangled with golden pyrite inclusions that look like st...

Carnelian is pure creative fire in stone form. This vibrant variety of chalcedony ranges from pale orange to deep reddish-brown, colored by iron oxide...

Obsidian is volcanic glass, formed when felsic lava cools so rapidly that crystals barely have a chance to grow. That glossy, mirror-like surface has ...

Jade actually encompasses two distinct minerals: nephrite and jadeite. Both have been revered across civilizations for their beauty and spiritual dept...

Turquoise is ancient. We are talking artifacts dating back to 6000 BCE in Egypt. That sky-blue to blue-green color, often webbed with brown or black m...

Garnet is a whole group of silicate minerals, with the deep red varieties (pyrope and almandine) being the most recognized. The name comes from the La...

Fluorite is one of the most colorful minerals in existence, and honestly, one of the most underrated. Vivid bands of purple, green, blue, yellow, and ...

Aquamarine is the crystal equivalent of standing at the edge of a tropical sea. This beryl mineral, colored by trace iron, captures the serene clarity...

Malachite is a copper carbonate mineral with those unmistakable swirling bands of light and dark green that create eye-like patterns. This is exactly ...

Yes, it is called fool's gold. No, there is nothing foolish about it. Pyrite is an iron sulfide mineral with a brilliant metallic luster that has tric...

Sodalite is a rich royal blue tectosilicate mineral, often marbled with white calcite veins that give it an almost cosmic look. Discovered in Greenlan...

Amazonite is a soothing blue-green variety of microcline feldspar named after the Amazon River (though, funnily enough, it is not actually found there...

Rhodonite is a manganese inosilicate mineral with a rosy pink body dramatically patterned with black manganese oxide veins. The name comes from the Gr...

Hematite is an iron oxide mineral whose name comes from the Greek haima, meaning blood (scratch it across a surface and it leaves a red streak). Polis...

Green aventurine is a form of quartz with a translucent green color and a sparkling effect called aventurescence, caused by tiny fuchsite mica inclusi...

Sunstone is a radiant plagioclase feldspar that contains tiny platelets of copper, hematite, or goethite, creating a brilliant sparkle reminiscent of ...

Lepidolite is a lithium-bearing mica mineral that ranges from soft lavender to deep purple and sometimes pink. Here is the fascinating part: it is the...

Howlite is a calcium borosilicate hydroxide mineral first discovered in 1868 by Canadian chemist Henry How in a gypsum quarry in Nova Scotia. Its whit...

Bloodstone (also called heliotrope) is a dark green chalcedony speckled with vivid red spots of iron oxide that look exactly like droplets of blood. M...

Agate is a banded variety of chalcedony that forms in the cavities of volcanic rock over millions of years, creating layered patterns as unique as fin...

Opal is a hydrated amorphous form of silica whose internal structure diffracts light into a dazzling spectral play of color. Every single opal is uniq...

Peridot is a gem-quality variety of olivine, an iron-magnesium silicate that forms deep in the earth's mantle and gets brought to the surface by volca...

Ruby is a precious gemstone variety of corundum, colored by chromium into hues ranging from pinkish-red to the coveted pigeon blood red. Second only t...

Sapphire is a precious variety of corundum that occurs in a stunning range of colors, though the deep blue form is the most iconic. The color comes fr...

Emerald is the green variety of beryl, colored by trace chromium and sometimes vanadium into one of nature's most vivid green hues. Cleopatra's legend...

Diamond is the hardest natural substance known to exist: crystallized carbon that has endured billions of years of immense heat and pressure deep in t...