Posts Tagged ‘chlorastrolite’

Picture Frame Pendant

Sunday, April 11th, 2010

p4080175I have come to the realization that I have not talked about any of my new designs in quite a while. My latest picture frame pendant has become my recent favorite, and I think these will become a popular items this year.

My interest has not always been in jewelry making and the lapidary arts. I started out in visual arts, especially water color. When you paint a picture, it always looks better in a nicely matching frame, so I thought why not stones? This got me thinking of all my wife’s beads and especially beads made from Michigan rocks and minerals.  Between the rocky Great Lakes shorelines, stony gifts from the glaciers, and mineral finds in the Upper Peninsula, Michigan has a real variety of stone to choose from.  Many of our Michigan stones are miracles, found here and really nowhere else on earth.  What if I could frame these beads in a collage featuring a variety of the most popular of these Michigan stones, making a picture of Michigan Miracles, or Lake Superior Miracles?

I started playing around last year with sizes and designs for my window boxes and this winter decided that the most pleasing shape and size may be a rectangular box of around 20X30mm. Stones can be arranged in pleasing and artistic ways within these confines. Thicknesses of the frames can also be manipulated to protect the beads therein. I have made a couple of much larger frames also that some people enjoy. Larger, or more stones can be used in these larger frames.

The featured stone in a Michigan pendant could be expected to be our Michigan greenstone (chlorastrolite) which is found in small areas of the Keweenaw Peninsula or on Isle Royale.  We had some very nice Isle Royale Greenstone beads that were drilled incorrectly. These beads were drilled so when they are strung, you can only see the sides of the beads and not the widest and best part of the greenstone. By using a prong-set on these beads I was able to turn the best faces to the front of the pendants, giving folks a very large size greenstone for a reasonable price.  The cost of these gemstones alone is worth our low pendant price.p4080180

I think it is important that the best possible beads be used. If I’m going to make a little piece of art, I want to use the best media (stones), that are available.  I am selecting from a nice variety of Michigan miracles: greenstone, Petoskey stone, datolite, jasperlite, thomsonite, firebrick, kona dolomite, epidote, favosite, hematite, prehnite, copper/silver half breeds, and Lake Superior agate.

Wire wrappers should be warned that these pendants take me three times the time that I commonly spend on a pendant! I also think that it helps to have some training in balance, layout, and color and an artistic eye to make these little treasures.

We have posted a couple of these little Miracle treasures on out website, and hope you will experience the same enjoyment wearing and showing these pendants as I do making them.

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Posted in Michigan Stones | 2 Comments »

A Most Wonderful Greenstone Hunt

Sunday, September 6th, 2009
The location of this hunt will remain a secret other then to tell you it took place somewhere in the Keweenaw Peninsula. This took place in September 2009.
Sometimes I think we rockhounds are a little crazy to go out and bang on rocks in the hot sun and call it “fun”. I think this is what convicts in chain gangs used to do. I bet it wasn’t fun for them! Other times we are out in a downpour because this is the best time to spot the type of rock we look for.
Let me tell you about one of those trips to an old rock pile in the U.P. when it was pouring rain. Bonnie and I donned our heaviest rain gear and waterproof boots and headed to one of the old mine dumps where we had previously enjoyed some success finding Isle Royale Greenstone. Immediately we found greenstones literally “washing out” of the banks in one small area on the pile. This is when you suffer bouts of greed, amazement, and wonder.
We harvested these stones as well as finding numerous other rocks full of Greenstone that we will remove later at home by cutting or breaking the matrix. Greenstones, when found, are generally small, ugly, dark green nodules. Often I see a glint of chatoyancy in the nodule, or the nodule may be broken and you can see the pattern where the break is.
Many of the greenstones we were finding that day were over one inch and we could see good chatoyancy in the nodule. This is remarkable size considering the average greenstone is maybe half the size of a pea. Over the course of four or five hours we picked up a gallon size ice cream bucket of loose nodules and larger nodules in matrix, and another five gallon bucket of greenstone bearing basalt. Greenstones are very rare and are found nowhere else on earth except Isle Royale and in the Keweenaw. Picking up this many in one day is remarkable. In one day Bonnie and I found more greenstone than the total amount we have picked up all the previous years we have been hunting.
I expect we will never have another greenstone hunt like this. It amounted to being at the right place, in the right location, at the right time. Few hunts work out this good. Dealing with the elements and not caring; finding valuable gemstones like they were common quartz; collecting not only treasures but memories. How great this was. I wish you could have been there.
Some of these new stones will be for sale on this website in the near future.

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Isle Royale Greenstone/Chlorastrolite (AKA Michigan Greenstone, Greenstone, Pumpellylite)

Tuesday, May 26th, 2009

Michigan’s State Gem, the Isle Royale Greenstone, Greenstone Pendant with Datoliteis unquestionably one of the rare minerals of earth. It can only be found on Isle Royale National Park and in Michigan’s Keweenaw Peninsula. Greenstone is a close relative of Epidote. Chlorastrolite (translated from Greek as green, star-like stone) is actually a form of Pumpellyite. “Chlorastrolite” was adopted as Michigan’s gem March 30, 1973.

Greenstone formed in amygdaloidal pockets of Keweenaw basalts. At one time Isle Royale and the Keweenaw formed one land mass. Isle Royale was spit off from the Keweenaw when the rift that formed Lake Superior split a giant gash in the earth.

Thanks to Benjamin Franklin, the Keweenaw Peninsula and Isle Royale are part of the United States. Franklin was a member of the commission that drew up the boundaries for the Treaty of Paris in 1773, ending the Revolutionary War. Ben Franklin had heard of the rich mineral deposits in the Keweenaw and Isle Royale so he drew the boundary line to the north of Isle Royale, giving this area to the United States instead of Canada.

The mineralization on Isle Royale is exactly the same as the Keweenaw. Native copper, Datolite, Prehnite, Thomsonite, Lake Superior Agates, Epidote, Greenstones, and the same basalts are seen in both locations.

Basalt 101-

As the basalts cooled, gasses tried to escape to the surface, the bubbles becoming smaller and smaller as they rose and tried to escape from the basalt’s clutches. The basalt hardened and trapped these bubbles known as “vesicles”. Also the cooling created shrinking and cracking of the basalt. These cracks in the basalts allowed different minerals in solution to flow into the vesicles, where they eventually solidified.

Copper, silver, arsenates, and other metals also filled the cracks and vesicles, but were disseminated by rising, super heated water instead of flowing down from the surface. The vesicles that the copper and other metals filled were sometimes huge and other times just cracks or small bubbles.

gs

Greenstone with Datolite and Copper

Greenstone with Prehnite

Greenstone with Prehnite

Copper associated itself with other minerals including all the previously mentioned material. The variety of material, mixed in different ways, is what makes this rock hunting area so intriguing. It is wonderful to see copper running through Greenstone, Datolite, Prehnite, and Lake Superior agates. Pieces of Greenstone/copper are highly coveted by collectors and jewelry makers like myself. The few pieces I have are priceless. My wife has a ring made out of one of these copper/greenstone pieces, and I still have a couple specimen pieces. She sometimes wears the ring to art shows, so ask her if you see us.  To see an example of copper with datolite, take a look at my Copper Lightning Datolite.

thom1

Greenstone with Thomsonite

Greenstone sometimes has Thomsonite inclusions, which make for a spectacular look. (Dark, chatoyant green and dark pink together) I’m waiting to find a Copper-Greenstone-Thomsonite some day. I have seen specimens of these at the Seaman Museum at Michigan Tech.

My next post will discuss finding and working with greenstones.


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Posted in Michigan Stones | 9 Comments »

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