Quartz Crystals

Gemstone Quality Standard

About Quartz

Quartz is a hard, crystalline mineral composed of silica (silicon dioxide). Quartz is the second most abundant mineral in Earth’s continental crust, after feldspar.

There are many varieties of quartz, several of which are semi-precious gemstones.

The Ancient Greeks referred to quartz as “icy cold”, because some philosophers (including Theophrastus) understood the mineral to be a form of supercooled ice.

This was also believed by the Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder. He believed quartz to be water ice, permanently frozen after great lengths of time. He supported this idea by saying that quartz is found near glaciers in the Alps, but not on volcanic mountains and that large quartz crystals were fashioned into spheres to cool the hands. This idea persisted until at least the 17th century.

Color

This standard refers to two different types of quartz:

Milky Quartz:

Milk quartz or milky quartz is the most common variety of crystalline quartz. The white color is caused by minute fluid inclusions of gas, liquid, or both, trapped during crystal formation. While on itself it is little appreciated as a gemstone, milky quartz combines very well with more colorful stones.

Clear Quartz (Rock Quartz):

Pure quartz, traditionally called rock crystal or clear quartz, is colorless and transparent or translucent and has often been used for hardstone carvings and jewelry.

You can buy our finished top-quality cabochons for jewelry makers.

National and international shipping from our US-based warehouse.

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Polishable

Quartz can be polished to a glass finish. Since antiquity, varieties of quartz have been the most commonly used minerals in the making of jewelry and hardstone carvings, especially in Europe and Asia.

Cutting Quality

Advantages:

Quartz does not tend to break or chip. Experienced cutters therefore can obtain very sharp unchipped edges between the backside and bezel as well as between the bezel and dome.

Top-cutting-quality is characterized by:

a polished backside
a sharp unchipped edge between the backside and the bezel
a very straight and even highly polished bezel
a sharp unchipped edge between the bezel and the dome
a well-shaped dome, not showing any deformation
Top-quality polish

Pricing

Adequate pricing must take into account the cost factors to obtain top-quality cabochons:

The very hard quartz requires more labor, more experience to eliminate scratches and the process involves increase usage of tools, all this increasing the cost.
Acquisition of top-grade Quartz.
A usual material loss of approximately 90 % of the selected material during the cutting and shaping process.
The level of experience required by a cutter to produce a flawlessly shaped and highly polished cabochon from such a hard material.

You can buy our finished top-quality cabochons for jewelry makers.

National and international shipping from our US-based warehouse.

Buy your Quartz Cabochons here

Cutting Quality:

Straight bezel (minor irregularities possible), 3 mm high
Perfect dome (3-5 mm high)
Edges between bezel and dome, as well as bezel and backside: sharp and crispy, minor chips on lower edge possible
Backside flat at 280 grit, unpolished

Pricing:

Recommended Retail Price (A):

Milky Quartz = 0.39 USD per carat

Clear Quartz = 0.69 USD per carat

Cutting Quality:

Straight bezel, 3 mm high
Flat and perfect dome (3 mm high)
Edges between bezel and dome, as well as bezel and backside: sharp and crispy, minor chips on lower edge possible but very rare.
Backside flat, at 280 grit

Additional Quality (AA+): Backside polished

Pricing:

Recommended Retail Price:

Milky Quartz = 0.69 USD per carat (AA+: 0.79 USD/c)

Clear Quartz = 0.99 USD per carat (AA+: 1.09 USD/c)

Cutting Quality:

Only cut by our best master cutters
Straight bezel, 3 mm high
Flat and perfect dome (1-3 mm high)
The edges between the bezel and dome, as well as the bezel and backside, are sharp and crispy, with no chips on the lower edge.

Additional Quality (AAA+): Backside polished to 3000 grit

Pricing:

Recommended Retail Price:

Milky Quartz = 0.99 USD per carat (AAA+: 1.09 USD/c)

Clear Quartz = 1.29 USD per carat (AAA+: 1.39 USD/c)

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