Andradite Garnet (new find)

Item Description

From a new discovery in 2018, these might be the best quality Andradites that I've seen from Dalnegorsk. I've seen plenty of golden, brown and yellow Garnets (mostly Andradite) from the area, but nothing as green as this. These particular crystals are not quite what I would call "Demantoid" as they have a bit more of an olive-green hue with a slight yellow overtone, but they are predominantly green in hue. This attractive miniature specimen is a very fine quality crystallized group loaded with sharp, well-formed dodecahedral crystals measuring up to just over 9 mm (nearly 1 full cm) which are associated with a few translucent prisms of Quartz and very little matrix. The crystals are incredibly smooth and well-formed with a gentle matte luster, and they're actually gemmy when backlit. The front / display side of the piece is in excellent condition with little damage, but the reverse side of the piece is contacted. Rarely does one find good quality green Garnets from any world locality on the market, let alone GEMMY crystals like this with such textbook crystal form. A great piece for any fan of Garnets or Russian minerals, and from what I was told, this was a VERY limited find and nobody knows if more will be found. For anybody interested, here is a link to the article that appeared in the Russian Mineral Magazine "Mineralogical Almanac" earlier this year ( http://www.minbook.com/site_files/24-1_EN_p06-07.pdf ).