Albite Value, Price, and Jewelry Informa on

FELDSPAR: Albite, Sri Lanka (4.6), New Mexico (3.9). Photo © Joel E. Arem, PhD, FGA. Used with permission.

Albite, usually colorless but some mes yellow, pink, gray or reddish. Translucent albite is some me colored green by chrome jadeite. It is also a component
trapiche emeralds.

Albite Value
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Albite Informa on
DATA VALUE

Name Albite

Is a Variety of Feldspar

Varie es Peristerite

Crystallography  Triclinic. Twinned; platy crystals.

Refrac ve Index  1.527-1.544

Colors  Colorless, white, yellow, pink, gray, reddish, greenish.

Luster  Vitreous to pearly.

Fracture  Uneven to conchoidal

Hardness  6 -6.5

Specific Gravity  2.57-2.69

Birefringence  0.008-0.011

Cleavage  Perfect one direc on; very good; imperfect

Dispersion  0.012

Luminescence  Usually none; may be whi sh in LW, lime green in X-rays (Kenya).

Transparency  Transparent to opaque.

 DATA VALUE

Absorp on Not diagnos c.

Spectrum 

Formula Ab100, Ab90

Pleochroism  None.

Op cs  α = 1.527; β = 1.531; γ = 1.538. Biaxial (+); 2V = 77°. See "Comments" for informa on on varie es.

Comments

Translucent albite is some mes found that is colored a rich green by inclusions of chrome-rich jadeite. Albite is some mes intergrown with emerald, especia
the strange hexagonal skeletal crystals known as trapiche emeralds. Facetable albite from Madagascar has indices: a = 1.530-1.531; β= 1.532-1.533; γ= 1.53
1.540; birefringence 0.009-0.010; density 2.62. Small faceted gems are fairly rare, almost always from the ps of cleavelandite crystals. Albite gems are col
most cases and not exci ng to look at. Albite moonstones are known from many locali es (discussed below).

Name

Albite comes from the La n albus, meaning white, because the mineral is usually white.

Occurrence

Albite usually forms at low temperatures; it is common in pegma tes, granite, and other igneous rocks, various metamorphic rocks, also marbles.

Essex County New York.

Ontario, Canada; Quebec, Canada; Madagascar; Austria.

Rutherford Mine, Amelia, Virginia: fine colorless albite, facetable, large; crystals are platy variety known as cleavelandite.

Upson County, Georgia: moonstone.

South Dakota: cleavelandite.

Brazil: cleavelandite.

Kenya: colorless crystals, some with blue or yellow nge.

(Indices: 1.535/1.539/1.544; S.G. 2.63). Many other locali es worldwide.

Stone Sizes

Clean gems are usually in the 1-3 carat range, from cleavelandite crystals. Catseye gems up to about 50 carats are known.

Royal Ontario Museum (Toronto, Ontario, Canada): 12.25 (catseye, Burma).

Devonian Group (Calgary, Alberta, Canada): 11.13 (cateye, white).

by Joel E. Arem, Ph.D., FGA

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