Detailed Description

A very pretty specimen, with a gemmy elbaite tourmaline, in a nest of albite (var. cleavelandite), together with a sharp quartz crystal. The elbaite crystal (0.8 cm) is colour-zoned, with olive green, a narrow band of grass green, and an essentially colourless cap, including a band of blue no thicker than the width of a hair. The crystal is glassy, lustrous and sharp. It is in excellent condition - a tiny nick is visible on one edge with magnification. There is a second elbaite embedded in the cleavelandite, with only prism faces showing. The quartz crystal has two points at the termination, split a bit by an albite crystal from behind. a beautiful, bright little piece. 

About These Stak Nala Tourmalines

Since the 1980s, elbaite toumaline crystals from the pegmatites at Stak Nala have been known worldwide. Particularly distinctive and prized when associated with albite and sometimes quartz crystals, these tourmalines are usually colour-zoned, with dark green to black-appearing centre sections, with zones of green, and sometimes pink, blue or colourless zones  at the terminations - often, a closer inspection with strong light or a strong reflective background are needed to show these zones.