Rock Crystal

Rock Crystal is a clear winner when it comes to Intaglios. Get it? Clear? Ok sorry. The clear quartz has a certain purity to it thanks to their transparent nature, so although they are often compared to chalcedony for the colour (or lack thereof), they’re actually something of an unsung hero.

Rock crystal, as a quartz, is a stone that is able to beautifully hold a facet, so even if they don’t have a colour-pop they are actually so beautiful and show off the engravings of the intaglios more than a hardstone like chalcedony. Sometimes they have almost like a diamond-type appearance. Of course you can afford a honkachonk rock crystal when compared to the price of a diamond of that size.

While the clear colour may not be the attention-grabbing feature, the carvings catch the light beautifully, making them more flashy and showy than chalcedony. Much like citrine, rock crystal is harder to carve and therefore requires a high level of skill, making them slightly less common than the hardstones like bloodstone, and more likely to be something super special like a heraldic.

They span the ages of the history of intaglios, starting out in the Georgian era as a household’s way to add privacy and authenticity to correspondences. At this time, they were pretty much only for the upper classes, but as the Victorian era brought in railway transport and made writing letters more popular and attainable, the invention of pastes gave the lower classes a way to mimic the crystal and get a bit more whimsical about the designs.

This means you can browse through the designs to find one that speaks to you, which you can turn into rock crystal jewellery with an intaglio that speaks to your heart, whether that’s giving modern meaning to something antique or giving your own meaning to a design. On the spiritual side of things, people love rock cyrstal for its healing properties, and while it isn’t considered a birthstone for any month, its ability to stand in for diamond means that everyone can access an April birthstone without having to lean into diamond pricing structures.

As the nearly nonexistent colour of the rock crystal allows for the setting to do some of the talking, they’re beautifully set in everything from rose gold to yellow gold and platinum. This allows for so much design flair for your own piece so you can make it that one of a kind jewellery that you can’t help but wear everyday.