Tourmalinated Quartz (I struggle to say the word but fortunately have no problems typing it…!).

The round stone on the left is a natural quartz with black tourmaline crystals while the stone on the right is synthetic quartz. How can you tell? A couple of big hints are that looking at the synthetic stone from the side you can see the join line at the girdle where the top (crown) and bottom (pavilion) are glued together with the black ‘tourmaline’ only appearing trapped in that one plane within the stone. In the natural stone the tourmaline crystals appear in all orientations so whichever angle you view it from you will see them extending through the stone.

Keep an eye on those internet purchases as these turn up as loose gems or set in jewellery… I’ve seen these for sale in bright pink, electric blue, bright yellow and apple green as well – none of them rutilated quartz they were being described as…