Polished Quartz Crystal Pendant from Quebec No. 112

   Polished Quartz Crystal Pendant from Quebec No. 112

The crystal is extracted from the Lac-Saint-Jean mine by a prospector-crystal cutter

The soldered silver wire highlights the semi-precious stone without altering it.

It is a quartz crystal polished by seven weeks of rotation in a barrel containing aggregate and water.  

Before processing, the points are extracted by hand by a crystal prospector. When harvesting crystals from the mountainside, the prospectors ensure they are removed with the greatest care. No blasting is used on the Cristal du Lac site.

To extract the crystals, the granite on both sides of a high-quartz fault must first be hammered using small tools such as a punch and a hammer to carefully remove them. Once the entire cavity is exposed, the quartz crystals can be harvested.

The prospector selects the crystals suitable for the various stages of polishing. Once this operation is completed, the crystals have a luster coveted for their smoothness and high quality. The polished crystals have the appearance of rock crystal with generally tiny intrusions of hematite (bright red).