A very rare larger and fully covered example from the finds of 2006-2007 or thereabouts. The piece masses in just under a kilo! These are the world's richest specimens of the species, comparing favorably, at their best color, with the old mid-1800s material from England. This piece has gorgeous, velvety coverage of plumbogummite richly coating matrix and earlier mimetite crystals: Many of the stubby mimetites are altering or altered to plumbogummite. Although there is some bruising, as typical for the find, the piece displays dramatically and has more color and 3-dimensionality than most. it would be among the larger and more important examples of this find

An Italian smoky quartz of exceptional clarity, from an unusual locale (at least to us non-Italians). This is a beautiful crystal with a slightly frosted finish to some faces, focusing the eye on the gemmy band through the interior as looked at, head on in the photos. It is nearly pristine: it has 2 small dings on edge corners , and a perfect termination atop. Just a nice Alpine quartz from an unusual locale. Size is as shown... the crystal is actually 10 cm tip to tip. Bonisoli collection. Joe Budd photos

This is a classic style of Guerrero amethyst, with snow white tips grown over grape-juice colored cores. The contrast is striking, unusual, and nearly unique to this location in terms of drama (it happens at Brandberg, too). This particular piece is really 3-dimensional, with two clusters growing at slight angles relative to one another and joining in the middle. I love the overall effect of geometry here...it is very striking in person. The major tips and all important parts are in pristine condition. There is some slight contacting around the edges, and the smallest crystal in the back of the cluster is (I suspect) repaired but is the most trivial one , anyhow. Nevertheless, the display is impactful, the piece is of good size, and the snow white tips really make this a special and dramatic specimen. Material like this hasn't been dug up in decades, and is hard to find today on the market. Joe Budd photos

This is a classic Tourmaline Queen tourmaline from the old days, the 1950s or early 60s, predating the modern era of commercial specimen mining in San Diego. It has a dramatic, intensely colored crystal of the classic Queen pink color, capped by a subtle zoned termination, and the tourmaline is in superb condition with no major damage and no repairs! The piece was sitting in a collection in a rock shop in the middle of nowhere, when I found it for sale in early 2010. It was a big clunker, in which this tourmaline and the quartz point you see were embedded within a massive chunk of quartz that had to be carefully removed, by whittling it down with small vibrating tools, to bring the piece to a more balanced size (with some risk!). It was purchased from Bill Larson of Pala Intl back in the mid- 1970s and the disappeared til now - a rarified example of matrix tourmalines from the mine which really defined San Diego tourmalines for much of the 1900s until the Himalaya Mine came back online as a specimen producer in the mid 1970s. Joe Budd photos

A large, imposing specimen of rich purple color, classic for this old district of English fluorite (actually, iron) mining. Most of these specimens from the Boltsburn are said to date to two spurts of mining in the early and in the late 1800s. Specimens of similar style dated prior to 1860 are well known, and in fact classics of the European museums. The mine was most famous for a particular sort of fluorite - this sort: big, gemmy, lustrous and interpenetrating fluorite crystals of huge size in association with sparkling quartz. It is absolutely indicative of the mine, and of its most famous style. The major crystals reach 9 cm, nearly 4 inches in size. The crystals are not quite pristine, but they are very close and given the age and size I can pardon what are really a few trivial dings only, in context. In fact, given the age and comparing this to other old specimens of big size, its miraculous they are in such superb condition. These pieces also fluoresce an intense, solid purple color under ultraviolet light (in fact it is from specimens of this overall district in England that the very word fluorescence was coined, after fluorite itself). Overall, an important specimen both for district and mine, and for fluorite in general. Weight is 5.5 pounds. Joe Budd photos

This elegant miniature hosts a glittering 3-dimensional "net" of intergrown gold crystals, forming seemingly wispy clusters atop a pedestal of quartz. Actually, the gold is quite robust, not fragile at all, but just looks so. For the style, this is classic Eagle's Nest material. This is a superb miniature gold specimen for the price, in my opinion, that I am blowing out only because it turned up in our move and was an old specimen I bought at old prices. Joe Budd photos

This superb large museum sized specimen showcases a gemmy, champagne-colored topaz crystal measuring 5.8 x 4.6 x 4 cm, dramatically shooting off of a matrix of associated white cleavelandite (in nice ballshaped aggregates), sharp golden muscovite, and lustrous clear quartzes. The combination of other species around the topaz highlights its color and symmetry nicely. The topaz crystal itself is absolutely unscathed by damage or dings on its edges, though it has a clean (i.e. invisible, but disclosed nonetheless) repair at its base (where the crystal disappears into the rock, it had naturally cracked in situ before it was mined). Aside from some trivial damage to the accenting quartz matrix, the display face is in good shape otherwise and presents as a 3-dimensional slope that lets the topaz rise for maximum height. A second, 4 cm topaz is laying diagonally at the foot of the major crystal. Note also the gemminess and lustre - while clarity and gemminess is common enough on these Pakistani topaz crystals, the shocking lustre here is atypical. It is top percentile, glassy and bright. Relatively fewer large topaz specimens seem to come out of the same pegmatites that produce beryls on end. And of the ones that do, fine matrix pieces are harder to get than for beryls or tourmalines, as well. Overall, this is about the size of a volleyball and it carries a LOT of impact. I have seen very few Pakistani topazes that enamored me so much as this one (in this size!). Mined in 2008. Joe Budd photos

This is a huge gwindel (twisted) quartz crystal that is perched on matrix with the aesthetics you would expect in a miniature, not in a piece the size and weight of a bowling ball! This locality produced such pieces in the 1980s, and few of such size and perfection, we think. It has been in the Daniel Trinchilllo Sr. collection (with specialties in both Quartz and Alpine suites); and then went into the well-known Marc Weill collection built up in the early 2000's. The crystal alone is nearly 7.5 inches long. It is over 2 inches thick and SO GEMMY AND LIMPID, its like looking into frozen water with sparkles trapped inside...and the clarity is really , really unusually good, especially in the size range. For a lage and colorless, totally clear gwindel, this would have to rank among the top few pieces of the style recovered from what I know of and can ascertain from asking the dealers and collectors of such pieces. The quartz sits, twisted, on a matrix of alpine granite with adularia feldspar crystals - and few come out with any matrix at all, let alone a nice pedestal of good balance in size. This is hands down one of the more important quartzes i have had, period. This piece weighs 11 pounds and comes with a custom display base. Joe Budd photos

An incredible thumbnail - superlatives simply cannot describe the beauty of this piece with its ridiculous sparkly covering of microscopic quartz over the deep green pseudo. I will go out on a limb here and pronounce it the prettiest single malachite thumbnail I have ever seen, and one of the prettiest thumbnails, period bar none. it is also pristine and complete on both sides, and sharp as you could wish. Rare material - I have seen only a half dozen pieces from this pocket over the years, and from context we think it came out in the 1970s sometime but that is just a guess. Pricey perhaps, but yes it is really that good.

A bright and sparkling, unusual combo from Michigan. The piece has sparkling, jewel-like analcimes to about a quarter inch just draping over and mostly covering an unusually large cluster of quartz for this mine. The piece is almost a floater, completely covered all around except where contacted at bottom. Bob Whitmore collection