Moonstone Bracelet

Moonstone is a feldspar - orthoclase, KAlSi₃O₈, Mohs 6–6.5 - built in fine alternating layers of two feldspars. Light entering the stone scatters between those microscopic layers and returns as a soft, floating sheen. That billowing light is adularescence, named for Mount Adular in the Alps.

The sheen drifts across the stone as it moves, never fixed - the body is milky white to pale grey, sometimes near-translucent, and the floating light reads blue in the finest material. It is the optical effect, not the colour, that has always been the point.

A feldspar like the amazonite and sunstone of the first set: softer than quartz at Mohs 6–6.5, with cleavage planes that ask the beads be spared hard knocks.

Asked often

What makes the floating light?
Adularescence - light scattering between microscopic alternating layers of two feldspars inside the stone. It floats and moves as you tilt the bead, seeming to come from within.

Is the blue sheen natural?
Yes. It is an optical effect of the stone’s layered structure, not a colour or coating. The finest moonstone shows a blue float over a near-translucent body.

Is it related to sunstone?
Both are feldspars. Sunstone flashes from metallic plates; moonstone glows from layered structure. Sun and moon, named for the light each seems to hold.

How do I care for it?
Wipe with a soft, slightly damp cloth and dry. As a feldspar it is softer than quartz and parts along cleavage - guard the beads against hard knocks, and keep the cord dry.

1. Worn on either wrist, over the hand, on a durable elastic cord.
2. Tilt it slowly in the light - the floating sheen is the point of the stone.
3. Wipe with a soft, slightly damp cloth and dry.
4. As a feldspar it parts along cleavage planes - guard the beads against hard knocks on stone, metal, or tile.

Many traditions rinse or air their stones from time to time; that is a matter of preference, and the rest is yours.

The elastic cord lasts longest kept dry - remove before swimming, bathing, or applying scent. Do not soak.

• Stone: Moonstone · orthoclase feldspar
• Composition: KAlSi₃O₈
• Crystal system: Monoclinic
• Hardness: Mohs 6–6.5
• Character: Adularescent · floating blue-white sheen
• Treatment: None · untreated
• Band: Durable elastic cord
• Origin: India / Sri Lanka
• Care: Wipe with a soft cloth · guard against hard knocks

The Romans believed moonstone was made of frozen moonlight, and Pliny recorded the belief that its sheen waxed and waned with the moon itself. The stone has been worn for that floating light across India and Sri Lanka, its classic sources, for many centuries, and it returned to fashion in the Art Nouveau jewellery of the early twentieth century.

For its likeness to the moon’s own light the stone has been read as a companion to night and to cycles across many cultures - named here as what people believed. The drifting sheen is the stone’s; what it calls to mind is the wearer’s.