FMF - Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[amethystguy]

These are my bi-color topaz crystals. All 3 are from Ouro preto, brazil.(Imperial Topaz). 100% natural..no treatments or funmny business that is usaually the case with topaz. Picked up in person from one of the mines as soon as they come out of the ground by a buddy of mine who lives down there part of the year and in minnesota part of the year.

The first one is 61cts.. 40mm x 13mm x 8mm
It has a body a rich orange color and a purple cap. The purple cap follows the trend of the termination. This was on it's way to the Houston show this year to be sold but i snagged in en route.

These next two are roughly the same size..around 5cts each.

I can tell you that it doesn't get to much rarer than true bi-color topaz. The only places that produce any true bi-color topaz is Ouro preto and Russia. These two small bi-colors are a little to included to cut. If they were facetable the price of them would be outstanding, My contact/bvuddy deals in lots of purple topaz specimen and facetgrade.. He has lots of purples but only so many bi-colored ones..only handfulls come out each year

[Tenney Naumer]

Hi AmGuy,

Congratulations! These look like the real deal!

Which begs the question:

Why did so many fab bicolored crystals show up all of a sudden?

Have you heard anything about how they are done?

Tenney (aka GringaPerdida)

[Pete Modreski]

Hi, all,
I'd like to share photos of a singularly unique topaz crystal from the pegmatites within the Pikes Peak Granite at Crystal Park, El Paso County, Colorado (in the foothills of Pikes Peak, just west of Colorado Springs). This one crystal was found by well-known Colorado collector George Fisher (deceased, a few years ago), and, unlike essentially all the other topaz from the Pikes Peak batholith, it has a striking resemblence to the Ouro Preto topaz. As you see the color is quite oraange, and upper terminations have a purplish tinge. I photographed this some years ago in George Fisher's collection; the size is approx. 2 cm long (I need to check for a more exact dimension). The second photo shows it in UV light (shortwave, I believe); also unlike the rest of the Pikes Peak topaz, the upper zones of the crystal have a reddish fluorescence, and as you see, certain faces have a quite bright yellow-orange fluorescence. Most unusual. I am not sure of the present disposition of this specimen; I wonder if Dave Bunk has aquired it?
My supposition would be that this crystal formed in a growth environment different than that of the usual pegmatite pockets in the granite; a hydrothermal environment that differed in, to me, still unknown ways from the typical ones there! I believe that the Ouro Preto imperial topazes are similarly fluorescent?
(The small blue-fluorescing crystals on the side I believe are feldspar, probably albite.)
Pete Modreski

[John S. White]

If I am not mistaken bicolored topazes have also been found from Ghundao HIll, Katlang, Pakistan.

[alfredo]

Some of the Japanese topaz was bicolored too; I've seen brown+blue and yellow+green, but fairly pale.

[Joan Kureczka]

We've got a blue/sherry colored topaz from Wolodrask, Wolinski, Ukraine.

[amethystguy]

I know Skip Simmons showed me a picture of a sweet bi-colored topaz blue and sherry he has from a obscure location in Russia or the Ukraine..one of the two. As far as the Katlang ones , my 2 Pakistani connections told me they have never seen a bi-color topaz from that location. I have been trying to grab onbe up for over a year but no one seems to have ever seen any That is a fantastic topaz, Pete Hey,Joan, could you please post a picture of your topaz, please?

[kywawa]

If using it to make a necklack, i think it much be great and nice..this topaz is beautiful..but if it's white, it maybe more beautiful..

[mmauthner]

Let's not forget the blue topaz crystals with yellowish (sherry?) cores from Espirito Santo, Brazil. One of the other HAMS members has the one I used to.

Mark