Collection: Super Seven

Super Seven, also sold as Melody Stone or Sacred Seven, is a quartz that carries several other minerals as inclusions within a single piece. The combination traditionally named for it includes amethyst, clear quartz, smoky quartz, cacoxenite, goethite, lepidocrocite and rutile, though not every stone shows all of them.

What you are actually looking at

The host material is quartz. The color and character come from what grew inside it: purple zoning from amethyst, smoky banding, and rusty red-orange threads and needles from the included iron and titanium minerals. The material has long been associated with Espirito Santo in Brazil, and pieces vary widely. Some are heavily included and dark, others nearly clear with only a scattering of inclusions.

How we choose it

Because the name is applied loosely in the wider market, selection matters here. We buy from miners and collectors we know, examine pieces in hand, and look for genuine visible inclusion variety rather than a plain amethystine quartz with a good label. Specimens, points, polished pieces and jewelry all appear in this collection, and most are one-of-a-kind, because inclusion patterns do not repeat.

Choosing a piece and caring for it

Decide first whether you want to see the inclusions clearly or prefer the deeper, more saturated material, since the two look very different in hand.

• Backlit photographs reveal inclusions; judge overall color in normal light.
• Quartz is hard, 7 on the Mohs scale, and wears well, though points still chip.
• Wipe with a soft damp cloth and dry it, and avoid harsh cleaners.

In crystal tradition Super Seven is often described as a stone that never needs cleansing, and many people work with it as one stone standing in for several. Whether or not you follow that framing, it is a genuinely interesting quartz. Browse the current selection below.