Spessartine Garnet

Item Description

Since the 1990s, China has been producing a plethora of fine crystallized mineral specimens. The iconic Spessartine Garnets from the Wushan Mine are some of the most recognized specimens to come out of any Chinese locality. These are remarkable for their form and color, and are soon-to-be-classics, certainly among the finest examples of Spessartine from anywhere in the modern era of mineral collecting. This wonderful miniature specimen features sharp, lustrous, gemmy, rich orange-red color crystals of Spessartine Garnet showing textbook trapezohedral faces which measure up to 6 mm across associated with minor Smoky Quartz sitting on white Microcline matrix. A tiny bit of green Muscovite can be seen under magnification. The piece is in excellent condition, with only minor roughness in a few spots. It's important to note that all of the Garnets are sharp and glistening showing no signs of etched / pitted faces (though they do have natural striations). When it comes to Garnet, there are thousands of localities around the world to produce specimens, but it's honestly not terribly common to find saturated colored crystals like this. These are not nearly as common on the market as they were years ago.