It’s a bit of a mess, and I stick to the above two varieties when purchasing online. The flash is almost the same as that of labradorite, but the fire often seems to “float” in the center of the stone.įrom there you have various color sub-divisions and even other minerals labeled as moonstone. Rainbow Moonstone- Similar to labradorite, but with high clarity.Some specimens display a light blue “fire” effect in addition. “Regular” Moonstone- A transparent to opaque white mineral which displays the characteristic moonstone sheen when cut en cabochon.There are two main varieties of moonstone available: Despite the proclamation, Florida remains bare of moonstone deposits. That has more to do with Cape Canaveral’s moon launch, however, rather than due to deposits of it in the state. Oddly enough, moonstone is also the state gem of Florida. It’s definitely possible to find the latter variety of jewelry bearing moonstone, however. As a semi-precious stone, you’ll see a lot of it in craft jewelry and from smaller smiths rather than being a common feature in fine jewelry. More recently, moonstone was heavily used in Art Noveau jewelry from the early 1900s and it remains a popular stone today. While a romantic myth, it’s quite clear why people thought that when you get a good look at white moonstone. In the ancient world, it was sometimes regarded as being solidified moon rays, crashing down from heaven and embedding itself on terra firma. Moonstone has been used in jewelry since antiquity. The name is also used for another feldspar mineral, Rainbow Moonstone, which is essentially ultra-high clarity labradorite and displays an internal fire similar to the surface fire of labradorite. This simply means that the surface of the stone catches light in a distinctive way, similar to common opal, not that it has the fire that typifies precious opal. However, it does not naturally occur in the state.Moonstone is a subvariety of orthoclase-feldspar that displays an optical effect known as opalescence. The moonstone is the Florida State Gemstone it was designated as such in 1970 to commemorate the Moon landings, which took off from Kennedy Space Center. In more recent history, moonstone became popular during the Art Nouveau period French goldsmith René Lalique and many others created a large quantity of jewellery using this stone. Both the Romans and Greeks associated moonstone with their lunar deities. The Romans admired moonstone, as they believed it was derived from solidified rays of the Moon. Moonstone has been used in jewellery for millennia, including ancient civilizations. Today, most commercial moonstones come from Sri Lanka. Historically, the most valuable, transparent moonstones with strong blue sheen came from Myanmar. A solid solution of the plagioclase feldspar oligoclase +/− the potassium feldspar orthoclase also produces moonstone specimens.ĭeposits of moonstone occur in Armenia (mainly from Lake Sevan), Australia, the Austrian Alps, Mexico, Madagascar, Myanmar, Norway, Poland, India, Sri Lanka,Īnd the United States. Adular in Switzerland, now the town of St. The most common moonstone is of the orthoclase feldspar mineral adularia, named for an early mining site near Mt. Asterism is rare and produces four-legged stars. Polished moonstones often display chatoyancy ("cat's eye" effect), where a luminous streak appears through the stone. More technically, this micro-structure consists of regular exsolution layers (lamellae) of different alkali feldspars (orthoclase and sodium-rich plagioclase). The diffracted light varies from white to blue, depending on the thinness of the albite layers. This effect is caused by light diffraction through alternating layers of orthoclast and albite within the stone. The name moonstone derives from the stone's characteristic visual effect, called adularescence (or schiller), which produces a milky, bluish interior light.
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