Thursday, February 12, 2009

Ruby in Zoisite

I had never heard of the mineral called zoisite until I looked it up a few minutes ago. The tag on today's bead strand reads, "ruby in zoisite", 12x10mm, 15 pcs.

How cool is that?! Yes, this is one of the grab bag bead strands mentioned yesterday from Rings and Things. These are triangular in shape and are multi-faceted (literally)! It's the faceting that gives it some sparkle, but I love the fun, bold colors!

While the colors are sort of watermelon-like, you could take this in many different design directions especially having 15 pieces to work with. The stringing hole on these goes through the pointed side, so they would work well on a strand pushed up against each other giving it an interwoven look as every other bead turns in the same direction. I think using 13 of them strung together would make a nice long focal piece to a necklace or bracelet. Then you can just string on some large sparkly crystals to make the bracelet band or the rest of the necklace. Of course, with the two leftover beads, earrings are a must!

OR...I just had a completely different thought about using these in a right angle weave design....Hmm, that sounds like fun!!

Let me know what you think!!

3 comments:

Dave Robertson said...

This is one of favorite gemstones because of the blend of colors. Plus (nerd alert!) I just realized that it's named after a baron who I used to hear a lot about when I was learning Slovenian. :)

--Dave

barbe said...

They are one of my favorite stones. I love them!

Anonymous said...

I like ruby in zoisite too. I'm making a necklace right now with a cabochon that I cut, plus faceted rubies in the pendant and ruby in zoisite beads in the necklace.