Judging quality
Value follows the needles: bright metallic gold, well-distributed, clearly visible and set in transparent host quartz. Dense chaotic tangles and dull brown needles are far more common.
Quartz
Rutilated Quartz
Clear or smoky quartz threaded with needles of rutile, a titanium oxide that grows in golden, copper or silver hairs. The best material looks like light frozen mid-flight.
Care
Handle carefully — surface-reaching needles can be brittle. Clean with water and a soft cloth.
History & lore
Historically called 'Venus hair stone' or fleches d'amour, arrows of love, in European lapidary tradition.
Cultural history, recorded as tradition rather than as medical or scientific claim.
Common questions about Rutilated Quartz
- What is Rutilated Quartz?
- Clear or smoky quartz threaded with needles of rutile, a titanium oxide that grows in golden, copper or silver hairs. The best material looks like light frozen mid-flight.
- How hard is Rutilated Quartz and what is it made of?
- Rutilated Quartz is a Quartz-family mineral with the composition SiO2 with TiO2. It crystallizes in the trigonal system and rates 7 on the Mohs hardness scale. It occurs in colorless, golden, silver.
- Where does Rutilated Quartz come from?
- Notable localities for Rutilated Quartz include Brazil (Bahia, Minas Gerais), Madagascar.
- How do you tell good Rutilated Quartz from filler?
- Value follows the needles: bright metallic gold, well-distributed, clearly visible and set in transparent host quartz. Dense chaotic tangles and dull brown needles are far more common.
- How do you care for Rutilated Quartz?
- Handle carefully — surface-reaching needles can be brittle. Clean with water and a soft cloth.
See it in person
Photographs only go so far
Both rooms are open six days a week, and there is always someone happy to pull pieces out of the case so you can compare them under the light.