Tourmaline (polished slice) (unusual coloring)

Item Description

This is an interesting and polished slice of Tourmaline from an undisclosed mine in San Diego County, showing and beautiful rich "Rubellite" interior and a thin green exterior "rind", creating a classic "watermelon" effect. What makes this piece different from others is the fact that when backlit, a rarely seen purplish-blue color can be seen, due to the inclusions of an unknown mineral. Perhaps it's just oddly colored Tourmaline causing the rare color, or maybe it's another species, but the effect is eye-catching, and rarely seen in Tourmaline. The periphery of the piece is almost complete all around, but there is one spot of damage, so it's not 100% pristine. Specimen weight is 34.03 carats.