Catalog Search Guide

You can search our catalog using different mineral attributes. For example, you can search by color such as green, yellow or purple, or by chemical elements such as uranium, calcium or iron, or by mineral groups such as phosphate, silicate or carbonate. You can also filter by crystal habit like crystal, geode or crystal on matrix, by specimen size such as thumbnail, small, medium or cabinet, and by features such as radioactive or fluorescent minerals.

Smoky Quartz

Smoky Quartz is the brown-to-black transparent variety of crystalline quartz (SiO2), colored by natural gamma irradiation acting on trace aluminum impurities within the lattice. Shades range from pale smoky gray to the near-opaque black known as morion, and crystals typically show classic hexagonal prisms with sharp terminations, sometimes with color zoning or phantom growth.

Typical occurrences are granite pegmatites and Alpine-type fissures, where evenly colored, gemmy crystals develop alongside feldspar, chlorite, and adularia. The Swiss Alps have produced museum-grade smoky quartz for centuries, historically mislabeled "smoky topaz" by jewelers, while Pikes Peak and Crystal Peak in Colorado are famous for smoky quartz paired with vivid blue-green amazonite. Scotland's Cairngorm Mountains gave the stone its traditional name "cairngorm," once prized for kilt pins and Highland jewelry, though authentic Scottish material is now scarce. Brazil, especially Minas Gerais, remains the world's largest producer, and notable specimens also come from Fujian Province, China, associated with orange spessartine garnet.

Collectors value smoky quartz for its combination of abundance and striking aesthetic range: from gemmy Alpine points to bold amazonite-smoky quartz matrix pieces and dramatic morion crystals. Matrix specimens with documented locality — Swiss, Colorado, or Brazilian — command the strongest premiums, making provenance essential for serious mineral collections.