00:00:58.160wherever you are i'm looking out the window it's been a wild weekend of wind
00:01:02.280we came home from a weekend away and there are the footprints of wild geese all sheltered on
00:01:09.080one side not wild geese wild turkeys all sheltered on one side of our house and then
00:01:14.260And this morning, as I was preparing for this conversation, I watched a little flock of fat, wild turkeys walk by on the lake, leaving their little triangle imprints across.
00:01:26.120And it felt like a friendly visitation and also a reminder of how rough this season is and how we need to stick together.
00:01:33.860I know for many of our listeners and friends and coven mates, this season has been a struggle.
00:01:43.320I mean, this is a time of celebration and also a time of loss, trying to find who we can rely on, getting frustrated by the world, in my own family, seeing people who don't have a lot get pushed aside and struggling to not just react with anger at how that's happening, but just be there for the people who are getting shuffled about.
00:02:12.360I don't know I'm struggling with all that I don't know where you are but welcome home to here to
00:02:19.720the common we make between our ears let's talk about the magic of craft and the sacredness of
00:02:27.600making let's talk about gems and gem stories and gem lore and let's hear from a witch who brings
00:02:39.680this true love and attention to making these beautiful family heirloom objects and how she
00:02:48.200thinks about it. It's Christmas time. Let's talk about sparkly, beautiful things.
00:02:55.600Welcome to the podcast, Michelle, Jack Reynolds. How are you? Can you tell us a bit about your
00:03:02.960work how this season is treating you um yeah so my work god my work I I've been making my work
00:03:14.240since I was five years old um I uh I that's my earliest memory of being an artist and a jeweler
00:03:22.560and actually jewelry is how I got to be in this world to begin with because my parents met across
00:03:29.480a jewelry case. My mom was a jewelry department manager at a store here just outside of Cleveland,
00:03:38.300Ohio. And my dad was a Cleveland Clinic police officer. So many people around the world may know
00:03:45.420of the Cleveland Clinic hospital system. So I live about 45 minutes from Cleveland, Ohio. And
00:03:53.420when I was little, my dad was an officer there. And like many officers in their off-duty hours
00:04:00.540would work local loss prevention jobs. So he, you know, picked up, you know, just some extra
00:04:07.040hours here and there. And that's how my parents met. And they got married and had me shortly
00:04:15.480after that so jewelry is how I got got to be here um to begin with so but um as far as working in
00:04:25.160precious metals and gems that didn't start until high school and prior to that I was using babysitting
00:04:32.380money to buy stones and beads and stuff from my local craft store and would just you know make
00:04:38.780things and make things for myself and my girlfriends but at five years old I was really
00:04:46.040inspired by the live action tv show Wonder Woman with the actress Linda Carter in it because who
00:04:52.620doesn't want power bracelets and magical tiaras and like a golden lasso of truth that could get
00:04:58.220bad guys you know to tell their secrets and everything so jewelry that gives you superpowers
00:05:04.840you know is is how I got started but I was I was very lucky my high school um so I graduated high
00:05:14.040school in 1995 so this is when vocational programs still existed at the high school level here in the
00:05:19.720states um my high school had a jewelry class and so I got to work in a jewelry studio in the 10th
00:05:30.340grade and start working with silver and enamels and a little bit of gemstones, but mostly like
00:05:37.320silver work and how to work with the silver and the materials. And then since I had to put myself
00:05:45.620through college, Kent State University, which was a school that I could drive to from my parents'
00:05:53.300house because they could support me by allowing me to live at home for free, I commuted back and
00:05:59.900forth to Kent State for the fashion and jewelry program and got my degree from that program in
00:06:07.1402001 and started my business shortly after that. You mentioned that one of your early experiences
00:06:20.140was learning to work with silver. How do you think about precious metal work these days?
00:06:27.160it's complicated well you know as with all relationships especially long-term ones that
00:06:38.940we humans have with with things every relationship is complicated um i i've worked with silver and
00:06:48.500now i'm working in fair mind gold um you know humans have worked with metals you know for
00:06:55.960for millennia i mean we we have whole huge sections of history like the bronze age and and all of that
00:07:03.340so you know we've we've worked with these materials we've been mining these materials
00:07:08.900for a long long time um so i my relationship with the materials is one where like what's
00:07:21.460the best material for the story I'm trying to tell through a collection of jewelry each collection
00:07:28.560I make I it it has a backstory and it has an inspiration to it and I don't I don't just make
00:07:37.120things to make them pretty like yes they have to be aesthetic aesthetically pleasing and of course
00:07:42.760you know they have to look good and they have to hold up but I'm really interested in like exploring
00:07:50.140Like right now, the past few years, I've been interested in exploring the lore between stones and like how various cultures around the world have related to certain stones and use them and the stories we tell about them and the stories that get passed down about them.
00:08:09.240So I think about them as, as sometimes almost as like time travel on my workbench, because some of these stones take hundreds of thousands of years to form deep in the earth.
00:08:26.820and you know a gemstone miner somewhere in the world found them and you know brought them to
00:08:37.220light and now here they are on on my workbench um and and they're part of telling a specific story
00:08:44.640for a collection so I think about them you know differently um as time has gone on and especially
00:08:52.360the past couple of years um as i've deepened my research in gemology like prior to my daughter
00:09:01.420being born um and my daughter's now six almost six and a half going on 30 but you know
00:09:08.160and um but prior to that i i didn't give much thought to the raw materials it was just like
00:09:17.940well what's going to fit for what I'm going to make and then I would have to go hunt it down
00:09:22.700and now that you know when she was about two and a half she her two favorite questions are who made
00:09:31.100it and how did it get here like she didn't ask why like the way other kids do and so there was
00:09:38.440a moment in the studio there's actually a little clip um and the highlights reel on my Instagram
00:09:44.720from one of my Instagram stories so the highlights reel is the title of that collection is in the
00:09:49.980studio there's this little blip of her it's the very first video of her um just being in awe of
00:09:57.560what's on my workbench and talking about how pretty it is and how there's so many of it and
00:10:02.020like all this stuff but the part of the conversation that of course I turned my phone off
00:10:07.300because she was getting into things was who made it how did it get here and I gave her you know
00:10:13.940because I'm puttering around in the studio and so you know like typical parent who is busy you
00:10:19.660kind of give like the answer that you think is going to pacify the kid and she's like no mama
00:10:25.220I don't think so tell me who like she wanted specifics and I realized in that moment like0.65
00:10:31.800oh shit I couldn't tell her who found the stone or who you know turned the silver ingot into wire
00:10:42.240for me to work with um and and so that began a a commitment to well I need to know and so I started0.98
00:10:55.260looking into more of you know ethical sourcing and fair trade fair mind um and it it's really
00:11:06.780changed how i relate to the materials um like right now i'm i'm reading a um report out of
00:11:16.700that was put out by the organization or uh what was it called i have it in my notes
00:11:23.780because they go by it was the organization for economic cooperation and development
00:11:29.120about gold flows out of venezuela um because there's a lot of illicit gold trading going on
00:11:37.260and and so like i'm i'm learning about how these raw materials move around the world like we've
00:11:47.080all been talking supply chain for the past two years because of covid stuff and the supply chain
00:11:55.160for raw materials especially as we increase our demand for like green energy the demand for gold
00:12:03.560is going to increase because gold is needed to plate the microchips because gold doesn't conduct
00:12:09.440heat the way other materials do or like lithium for rechargeable batteries in electric vehicles
00:12:17.180and other devices like if you can't grow it you have to mine it so our relationship with
00:12:25.240mining these materials is going to change as we move to a green a greener economy so to speak and
00:12:33.040and the the jewelry um component of you know the gold supply chain is part of that
00:12:41.800yeah i think like many witches we've all been struggling to figure out where you know to have
00:12:51.700a healthier relationship with the materials we use the ancestors that we're working with
00:12:57.140um you know i think it's okay that we started a little bit um naive just sort of grabbing
00:13:05.240crystals that we were excited about at a gem show or like an esoteric shop near us
00:13:10.900um but you know we're growing up and trying to be better stewards and understand
00:13:17.620the dynamics of where these how these things are coming to us um
00:13:22.600yeah i'm also pausing to read this question um it is interesting to think about a reciprocal
00:13:35.160relationship with our materials for sure as is kind of coming up in the chat um i wonder how you
00:13:43.080think about the way that the power of those materials the stories in them the magic is
00:13:49.700impacted by what you learn about their their origin um well a lot of what what a lot of people
00:14:01.040don't realize like one of the terms like since we were talking about gold one of the terms that's a
00:14:07.340big buzzword as uh you know consumers demand more traceability in their products is recycled gold
00:14:15.720and the truth of the matter is the vast majority of the gold that's in the marketplace now
00:14:21.640is all the gold that's ever been mined in the world since human beings started mining it and
00:14:26.380extracting it so it's been recycled a lot already um the issue with recycled gold and this is
00:14:35.880something that i learned in becoming a fair mine licensed designer so fair mine gold is about
00:14:45.740changing the mining sector and it's about artisanal small-scale mining and traceability
00:14:52.120so recycled gold you don't know the origin necessarily of the gold and so that can be a
00:15:01.100challenge because you don't know if it's coming you know where it's coming from how it was sourced
00:15:05.700was you know the best environmental practices used um you know all of those things with fair
00:15:13.260mind the miners who go through the fair mind licensing process have to abide by all these
00:15:19.400regulations and requirements of the certification. And a lot of that's overseen by the Alliance for
00:15:30.700Responsible Mining. But the issue is it comes down to supply and demand. Only 33% of the gold
00:15:41.100available in the marketplace right now is recycled gold. 1% of the gold available in the marketplace
00:15:48.880is fair mine gold so we're not going to ever stop mining gold um it's just a matter of how it's done
00:16:01.920um here in the u.s fair mine gold's only been in the market available in the market since 2014
00:16:08.940we're only talking seven years and it takes a long time to build
00:16:15.960you know consumer awareness about it demand for it and all of those things so the way i i think
00:16:23.420about the gold that i'm interested in working with is like i see the miners whether they're
00:16:31.060the precious metal miners or like the gemstone miners i see their hands as an extension of my
00:16:37.420hands and like i can't make my work without them doing their work um and how they go about it like
00:16:48.320knowing that what i'm buying is supporting them in their communities because many parts of the world
00:16:55.500where artisanal small-scale minor mining is going on is it's remote it's rural you know opportunities
00:17:05.280are very limited. Many of these miners are also farmers part of the year. So this is additional
00:17:11.020income for them and stability for their communities. And also, if they're not able to
00:17:18.820protect their land, you're going to have a legal and illicit mining move in. And that's another
00:17:26.060challenge to address um with it so it's it's complicated and it's messy and you know there's
00:17:36.780no perfect solution um like I just attended the Chicago Responsible Jewelry Conference a couple
00:17:44.160weeks ago and we were talking one of the presenters was talking about how there's 45
00:17:49.320five different like certification programs that are trying to tackle traceability issues
00:17:57.840within the you know gold and gemstone tray none of them are perfect but they're all a step in
00:18:06.340the right direction yeah that's that's sort of what I was going to ask next was if there are
00:18:12.400similar certifications or processes for for crystals or gems but it sounds like there's
00:18:17.780so many like it's it's as as multifaceted as the stones themselves people trying to figure out how
00:18:24.000to do this right yeah yeah it's and and a lot of it comes down to what is the marketplace going to
00:18:33.560support as with anything you vote with your wallet um so years ago in the 90s you had for diamonds
00:18:41.760the kimberly process come out which was about certifying that diamonds were conflict-free
00:18:49.020well the kimberly process is limited in scope to just ensuring that it's not funding conflict
00:18:58.800that's not saying um uh that's not saying that um there there isn't child labor there isn't
00:19:10.460forced labor that you know there isn't all these other potential things going on um the issue uh
00:19:18.600i as someone just put in the chat about 3d printed diamonds um there aren't 3d printed diamonds
00:19:24.340you're talking about like lab created diamonds um so lab created diamonds there's two processes
00:19:31.260for that it's high pressure high temperature so you're basically replicating the natural
00:19:38.760processes deep in the earth um except you're doing it in the lab and one of the other ways
00:19:48.580of creating lab-created diamonds is through carbon vapor deposition so cvd um and
00:19:58.300though that technology has been around since like the 1950s it wasn't until recently
00:20:04.000that those diamonds the technology improved to create um a jewelry grade diamonds
00:20:12.280so the issue is lab created stones use massive amounts of electricity right to replicate those
00:20:24.380natural forces and so where is that electricity coming from and
00:20:31.200that is a challenge a lot of lab-grown diamonds are produced in in china right now and we know0.52
00:20:42.600china doesn't have the best environmental standards um and and so it's it's kind of
00:20:51.160the wild west right now for lab created diamonds there were a lot of claims of lab created diamonds
00:20:58.300being a more sustainable source a more ethical source well here in the u.s the federal trade
00:21:02.820commission said oh no no hold up like you can't make those claims because you can't claim something
00:21:09.860you can't prove right and like same with when i make a claim about the sourcing of my stones
00:21:17.100so like i just purchased for my upcoming collection i just purchased all these beautiful
00:21:24.400fully traceable rough sapphires through moyo gems so you were talking about like traceability for
00:21:29.900stones um so moyo is fully traceable i can tell you the miners names who mine the stones that
00:21:39.000are going to be in my collection. Um, and what Moyo is doing is supporting, um, predominantly
00:21:49.240female miners. There are a few male miners who are part of, um, the cooperatives and stuff in
00:21:56.680Tanzania, but it's supporting them and enabling them to bring the stones to market. And many of
00:22:04.560are mining um you know on on their own land you know tanzania is rich in minerals and gemstones
00:22:13.960and the tanzanian government wants things to go through the proper channels as opposed to
00:22:21.740you know you hear if if you're hearing about stones um you know coming from madagascar
00:22:28.620you know madagascar there's there's a not um a lot of um i'm trying to find the right word
00:22:41.000there's there's not a lot of traceability going on in madagascar there's a lot of um
00:22:48.540conflict there's a lot of illegal mining going on and so what's happening there is you know you
00:22:56.820could be funding child labor you can be funding you know military owning a mine so but madagascar
00:23:06.320knows because people are labeling stones in the marketplaces madagascar you know stones
00:23:12.480well these didn't go through you know the proper customers channels so traceability is is a big
00:23:21.960issue and so what I have shifted to um is either if I can't mine it myself um like I did for the
00:23:31.680stones in my Mira collection then I'm only going to work with the gemstone dealers and the gemstone
00:23:39.400miners that I know personally and I can tell you to go back to my daughter's question who made it
00:23:45.860and how did it get here I have to I'm accountable for answering that now you know
00:23:51.500It's, um, so it's, is it kind of akin to the movement in like coffee and cotton away from what's been called fair trade and toward direct trade?
00:24:08.860yeah it's it's similar to that so it there is a movement um you know for fair trade fair mind
00:24:21.140stones it's it's along those same lines because if like i can go to my grocery store and pick a
00:24:27.460certain brand of tuna off the shelf and it says type in this barcode and we can tell you which
00:24:33.180ship this can of tuna came from you know we should be able to do that on some level with gemstones
00:24:40.760like something far more you know lasting than than a than a can of tuna um and and so that's
00:24:52.180that's starting to happen a lot of that's because of blockchain technology um which is i i don't
00:25:01.160understand blockchain technology but as far as that like you can't um uh within the blockchain
00:25:09.380you know like you can't edit nobody else can change it or mess with it like I'm still learning
00:25:16.020all that stuff um so a lot of it's come down to technology and also just people's ability to
00:25:24.320connect in ways we weren't able to before you know when covid happened my friends um monica
00:25:32.260stevenson who helped uh who's the founder of anza gems who also helped create the moyo gems
00:25:40.800it's me and miners because we could do it online as opposed to her being able to go there
00:25:51.320um so years ago that that Michelle you cut out for a second and you cut out just when you were
00:25:58.300saying uh the the origin of that company and what it does okay so so Moyo Gems and Anza Gems
00:26:09.620were founded by my friend Monica Stevenson and so what Moyo is doing is empowering
00:26:20.860female miners um and uh in the tanzania's tanga region and so the connectivity that we're able to
00:26:33.960have because she couldn't travel there because of covid you know she would go there a couple
00:26:37.220times a year and buy direct from the miners because you you look through hundreds of thousands
00:26:43.380of stones to then decide which one you're going to buy because it has to be marketable you know
00:26:50.340it has to be financially viable. And so what she's doing is the miners that are mining the
00:26:59.600stones in Tanzania, they're getting far more money from her for their stones than going through the
00:27:04.960channels that existed before. So often it would be like a broker who would, you know, and then
00:27:10.300the miner would only get a tiny portion of the money for their stones. So this is changing that.
00:27:18.020And also because she is, you know, tracing who mined it and ensuring that it was mined responsibly through the partnerships that she has with the Tanzanian government and everything, that I can tell you who mined the stones that are going to be in my next collection.
00:27:41.040I can tell you every single stone and every single piece.
00:27:44.640And as far as the fair mine gold that's going to be in these pieces, I can tell you through my supplier that it's come from one of two gold mines in the world because of where they source fair mine gold from.
00:27:59.780So it's it becomes this very tangled web after a while.
00:28:05.180um but it's exciting to work with these materials because I now know and can and can provide people
00:28:17.520with that information and when I tell people what I'm working with like they're like you can do that
00:28:22.000now yeah I can I can do that now like the it we're at that stage we have a long way to go
00:28:31.440but we're at that this is the stage we're at in the game
00:28:36.720it kind of brings i want to talk about gem more you brought it up earlier um and i've been
00:28:44.460thinking about how much the stories we tell give these objects power you know you look at the
00:28:52.880history of diamonds diamond diamonds have done such a good job of marketing themselves marketing
00:28:58.700the uh the rarity of diamonds when when really if i understand correctly most other gemstones
00:29:05.080are much more rare and harder to get at than diamonds um they just did a great job of sort of
00:29:11.300telling a story marketing a story around engagement and whatever but so which is i think something is
00:29:20.840which is we're really comfortable with that our our stories give give objects power and then
00:29:26.020objects give the stories power and it's a it's a relationship um and you're you are part right now
00:29:32.660of writing a new story like investing a new story with magic and being able to know the names and
00:29:38.900the traceability and see the faces and see the land where these things are coming from
00:29:43.380in the history and then you sit with all of that at the bench but then you're also drawing in
00:29:49.860these mythologies of gems can you talk about that a little bit
00:29:56.020yeah so the mythology of gems is actually how i found you and amy
00:30:04.200so when i wanted to deepen my gemology research and knowledge you know i had actually thought
00:30:12.300about getting my um graduate gemologist certification but that would be about
00:30:18.040another 20 to 25 000 in education on top of my bachelor's degree and master's degree i already
00:30:24.220of and I'm like well I want to know more than what I can just see under a gem braid microscope
00:30:32.360you know I want to know more than just crystal structure and durability and the Mohs scale of
00:30:40.280hardness which is like how stones are ranked in their level of durability so like diamond is the
00:30:46.800top and something like you know chalk like like sidewalk chalk is at the bottom you know and
00:30:56.120pearls are somewhere in the middle you know they're like a four so it's that type of stuff
00:31:01.140I wanted to know more I wanted to understand our how different cultures relate to different stones
00:31:09.320and and stones have been written about in all kinds of different sacred texts like you have
00:31:18.020in the in the abrahamic tradition especially in like the old testament you have stories of
00:31:25.480aaron's breastplate having very for having 12 specific stones to represent the 12 tribes of
00:31:31.600There's Israel, which is some of the origins of birthstones, or at least one of the origin stories of birthstones, because every culture has different stories of that.
00:31:45.240Like in the Koran, you have different levels of heaven being associated with different gemstones.
00:31:53.520You have all these different tales, but not just in sacred text.
00:31:59.640You also have, you know, different novels that have connected certain characters to certain stones.
00:32:09.040You have different, like in Greek and Roman times, quartz crystals were dipped in cold water and put on wounds as ice packs because the stone would get cold.
00:32:24.000um so you have what what has the stories that have survived history there's a connection to
00:32:30.680stones and crystals um i mean everything that makes our modern life what it is is connected
00:32:38.440to stones and crystals it's just in a form that we don't easily recognize it so like for example
00:32:44.240if you have drywall in your home um that material is the industrial grade version of selenite
00:32:56.480and we call that industrial grade version of selenite gypsum so it's gypsum drywall so you
00:33:03.840can walk into any home improvement store and you know buy sheets of gypsum drywall
00:33:10.620selenite in its finest form is alabaster so alabaster uh one of the one of the um the sacred
00:33:21.480uses of alabaster was in the knoptic jars in egypt like that would have like when when pharaohs were
00:33:28.620mummified their organs were put in those alabaster jars um but even in the in the new testament you
00:33:37.320You have the story of the woman with the alabaster jar.
00:33:40.580The alabaster jar held all this perfume that she anointed and washed Jesus' feet with.
00:33:47.280It's all selenite, just in different forms or different quality levels.
00:36:04.020And I didn't realize how sacred my creative practice was
00:36:10.800until I became a mom and I didn't have any free time anymore.
00:36:16.840um and and just how how critical having time at the bench and time at the studio was like even
00:36:27.320if I got 15 minutes like when I was on you know maternity leave uh when my daughter was first
00:36:33.440born and not sleeping and barely being able to shower on a regular basis because the days of
00:36:39.580breastfeeding a newborn are insane let alone having the energy to create anything but sustaining this
00:36:46.400little you know voracious eater um I realized then just how how sacred it was and then when
00:36:55.580COVID hit and I had to add um at home preschool teacher to my resume um you know just just how
00:37:04.100critical my my art is like it's the through line for my whole life um but as far as like the stones
00:37:14.700and what I think about at the bench like you know some days the ideas I have for collections like
00:37:22.720this collection I'm working on right now it's an idea that has gripped me for a couple years
00:37:27.520and being able to research it and some of the designs that I'm working on right now
00:37:34.680are coming through as if I'm taking dictation and there's other days where it's just work0.97
00:37:39.820and then there's some days where it's just like a fucking slog like it's a grind like0.93
00:37:44.160it's just not coming together and you're just pushing through it um and and it's all it's all0.95
00:37:52.780there um but like we were talking about diamonds and before diamonds are pure carbon
00:38:01.920and we are carbon-based life forms diamonds you know you wouldn't think about how they're born
00:38:09.920and and i should go i should you know back up a little bit what we now understand about geology
00:38:17.460and gemology um we know that diamonds are born deep in the belly of volcanoes
00:38:23.960and it takes the force and the pressure of a volcano to create a diamond
00:38:28.780um so everywhere where there is an active volcano right now millennia from now future humans will
00:38:39.080be able to mine diamonds there once that volcano is completely extinct any other gemstone found
00:38:46.520in the world is a treasure hunter getting lucky um so we know now like where copper's found you
00:38:54.660will probably find malachite and azurite because those two minerals um and crystals have copper in
00:39:04.560them um and like malachite was often ground up into powder to make various cosmetics in egypt
00:39:14.840same with lapis um so not only are homes potentially gemstones but uh when you look at
00:39:24.840ancient artworks that have like that ultramarine blue look to them that's ground up lapis so you're
00:39:34.020looking at gemstones in liquid form um a famous painting like the dutch masters um like vermeer's
00:39:42.420girl with a pearl earring that blue in in her head scarf piece that is lapis um and and if
00:39:52.840you're looking for a cozy afternoon on the couch um you know the movie girl with a pearl earring
00:39:59.560with scarlet johansson in it there's this beautiful scene of her i can't think of the
00:40:04.380actor who played vermeer but um scarlet johansson portrays you know the character and it's a
00:40:12.100historical fiction piece but um portrays the character uh who becomes the model for girl
00:40:19.260with a pearl earring and there's a scene in there where it shows the two of them
00:40:24.500sitting next to each other in his studio grinding different compounds to make their own paints
00:40:31.980so I think about all those things when I'm at the bench I think about all what are all the various
00:40:37.460forms and what are the stories that have been connected to some of these stones um and like
00:40:45.560the sapphires I'm working with right now you know I'm looking at all the stories and all the legends
00:40:50.780of sapphires from like alchemical use to um different like what different sacred texts
00:40:58.720have to say about them how they've been worn and regarded and even some of the mistranslations
00:41:06.040in these sacred texts because all blue stones um you know millennia ago were called sapphire
00:41:13.820but they're very different um uh and uh so like i think about all of that does that mean it
00:41:23.480it all ends up in the work not necessarily um but those are the things that rattle through my head
00:41:30.560as as i'm working working at at my bench can you tell us some of the the sapphire stories
00:41:39.060yes so one of the stories is that the Ten Commandments were
00:41:51.580written on so one of the supposed mistranslations of
00:41:59.620scripture from that time is that Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai on
00:42:08.460sapphire tablets well sapphire is the mineral corundum so c-o-r-u-n-d-u-m it's one of the
00:42:20.980hardest minerals second only to like diamonds so the technology didn't exist in that time period
00:42:32.060that we're aware of to be able to carve into sapphire. However, in that part of the world,
00:42:41.100lapis is abundant. Some of the finest grade lapis comes out of Afghanistan.
00:42:48.200And in one of the stories is, you know, Moses dropped the tablets and they cracked. Well,
00:42:54.320if you dropped sapphire, it's not going to crack because it's one of the hardest materials on earth.
00:43:00.180however lapis is softer so it is entirely possible that those tablets were actually lapis
00:43:08.040and given how they're written about as having like gold flecks in them sapphire doesn't have that
00:43:15.040lapis has that so that's one of the stories also different um uh within the roman catholic church
00:43:24.300I believe it's it's the pope and maybe bishops, too, or cardinals.
00:43:30.600I know it's certain individuals within the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church.
00:43:36.080When they're ordained into that role, they're given a sapphire ring because the blue of sapphire is associated with the blue of heaven and divinity.
00:43:46.720um so and and one of the other stories that i read um it was a book by a medium and an astrologer
00:43:57.560um barbara hand clown and she was talking about the pleiades and how the pleiades communicate
00:44:06.040um with our planet through sapphires do i believe all of that no but i'm fascinated by it like i'm
00:44:16.060fascinated by our connection to those things and just like I was talking about you know the various
00:44:22.880grades of selenite before sapphire has a huge range of colors it's not just blue
00:44:29.640but sapphires when they are a deep pink almost red and even into the reds we call those rubies
00:44:38.560because kerumdom is the same mineral as rubies so even stones when they get into different color
00:44:47.760ranges and there's one i just posted um it's it's still considered a sapphire because it's not
00:44:56.500deep enough to be a ruby but i just posted a beautiful on my instagram a video of a beautiful
00:45:03.080deep ruby pink rough sapphire that um when i was shopping for the sapphires through moyo gems my
00:45:11.540daughter was looking over my shoulder and of course picked out a few for herself so that one's for her
00:45:17.680um uh with everything going on i don't know if i'll have it ready for in time for a christmas
00:45:22.580present so it might wait till her birthday this coming summer but um you know you can see that
00:45:29.600deep pink if it was more red it'd be called a ruby but it's the same mineral of kerumdom
00:45:34.720and so we call these things we give different things different names or we give different
00:45:43.460colors of certain stones different names um but they're still when you get down to the mineral
00:45:48.880level they're they're the same mineral so i just i find it all like fascinating and it becomes this
00:45:55.000big like melting pot crock pot soup thing in my head um and and and it all just kind of swirls
00:46:07.780around in there as I'm like listening to podcasts like yours in the studio um because that that's
00:46:14.920how I found like I said that's how I found you and and Amy I wanted to to find out more about
00:46:21.700the stones and the lore and the legends and and it popped up in a in like an Instagram algorithm
00:46:29.940thing like in the scroll and I was like wait what is this tell me more what is this and and so
00:46:38.120that's how how I found you guys and and that's led me down different paths of researching lore
00:46:44.580and and um how different since you cover so many artists in in your show and in your books like
00:46:52.920how they've used their raw materials and where they've gone to um in their research and their
00:47:00.640work in in you know more fairness and traceability with things even though they may not have been
00:47:06.300using that language at that time yeah so i don't know that's just a ramble and a tangent
00:47:11.380you know that's what we're all about um since you mentioned using these materials
00:47:21.220using them for color therapy using them for magic using them you know from the perspective of your
00:47:31.980the person who ends up with one of your pieces um yeah how do you think about how these objects go
00:47:40.560out and have a life of their own and and get used and do you think the shape of them affects how
00:47:46.620they can be used do you think and also I want to talk about geometry but I'm just slip it in now
00:47:52.380and we'll circle back to it yeah so shape
00:47:56.000I will definitely say in jewelry design shape is important because I have to be able to set a stone
00:48:08.800in a design so that it will survive and last through multiple generations of wear and love
00:48:18.420and use so when I create something I'm not just thinking about how is it going to you know hold
00:48:28.700up today but also like we all know the story of like great grandma's ring being passed down
00:48:34.280through multiple generations um you know and how we were talking about how i think about working in
00:48:40.980silver and gold like those materials like could i make jewelry and cheaper materials sure are those
00:48:47.160materials going to last and hold up across multiple generations not necessarily so the shape of stones
00:48:56.520matters because certain shapes i can set in a way so the stone is protected um certain stones
00:49:04.620uh like if they're too fibrous looking like they'd be great as a specimen in a collection
00:49:11.280but they would never survive in a piece of jewelry just given what a piece of jewelry goes through
00:49:16.420um and i'm drawn to shapes like if you look at my website i don't do anything with sharp angles
00:49:24.360I don't find them enjoyable to wear myself um could I make a piece with sharp angles sure
00:49:32.680I will more than happily make a piece with sharp angles if you want a custom order
00:49:36.680but as far as something that I would do on my own for a collection I don't foresee myself doing that
00:49:45.620I like working with the raw stones or like I've worked with geode slices and and petite geode
00:49:52.140pairs because it's the closest I can get to the moment of discovery like that the miners moment
00:50:01.580of discovery and I like working with the Herkimer diamond crystals that I mined myself a couple
00:50:09.140years ago because those stones the way they form they're naturally faceted so I can work with them
00:50:18.600and set them in a similar way that I would set a faceted stone, but nature did the faceting.
00:50:27.300That's so interesting. I hadn't thought of, is that, do you think the sort of primary
00:50:31.660defining factor in why gems are cut the way they are is so that they can be set safely,
00:50:39.760or is it sort of that in relationship with the crystal structure or amorphous structure
00:50:46.260of the material itself it's all the above um and when it comes to translucent stones
00:50:57.800or transparent stones like uh diamonds and even colored stones like sapphires and rubies you're
00:51:05.680trying what you're doing in cutting the stone so the lapidary artist is doing is they're not
00:51:11.160only working with the mineral and the crystalline structure they're also working with light
00:51:15.680because how the light bounces around in the stone is what gives it its sparkle and it's it enhances
00:51:23.820the beauty so there's that factor also in how it's cut um you you can't have a certain
00:51:34.520you you can't have a stone be too thin you can't like it's got to be cut like there's a reason why
00:51:41.140like the round brilliant cut for a diamond is so popular because it maximizes the light and the
00:51:47.820sparkle in the stone so it all depends on the stone and mineral some stones like carnelian
00:51:54.620which is beautiful stone is beautiful just as a smooth cabochon so it's not going to have facets
00:52:01.440um or like turquoise you're not really going to see turquoise faceted because it's an opaque stone
00:52:08.360um so it's all it really depends on the stone and and the crystal my philosophy when it comes to
00:52:17.240if people are using stones for metaphysical practice is go with what resonates with you
00:52:23.480and with what you're drawn to um go with what you connect with um and and depending on
00:52:35.220on like your budget, like you don't need to go out and buy expensive stones and crystals. Like
00:52:41.380a stone has power if you decide it has power. So if it's a stone you find on a walk in the woods
00:52:47.320or, you know, on the beach, then that's a special magical stone. Like it doesn't need to be,
00:52:56.320you know a selenite wand or you know a a um a perfect like crystal point like it you don't need
00:53:06.540that necessarily i think that's the uh the exact quote why how we found each other hey michelle
00:53:16.880it was the there was a there was a cunningham quote about the the power of stones washed up
00:53:25.180on the beach having the same powers expensive crystals um that was like one i think like the
00:53:31.460fourth thing we ever shared on instagram or something because we were like this is this
00:53:35.940is touchstone for us this is core for us is is anti-capitalist magic um and the and the the
00:53:43.880individual power and recognizing that you resonate with something and i think it's so funny every
00:53:49.540time we have a coven meeting we all end up saying i really resonate with that i really resonate with
00:53:54.000that and you can feel the like sort of wave going around the circle as everyone is is identifying
00:53:59.700things that make them resonate why do you think some stones some people connect with some stones
00:54:09.080you know it's personal and cultural preference really um you know different just like how
00:54:20.780different colors you know we talked about color therapy a little bit ago um or alluded to it
00:54:26.300just like how different colors mean different things in various cultures um different shapes
00:54:32.740mean different things in various cultures as well um and and like like i said i'm drawn to
00:54:41.720more amorphous shapes i'm drawn to like ovals and teardrops and one of the signature things
00:54:50.640I do in in my collections is I've done a lot of like gemstone clusters with gems or pearls set
00:54:58.320on little pins precious metal pins so it really comes down to you know the same reason why why
00:55:09.320are some people why why do some people have blue as their favorite color or green as their favorite
00:55:14.920color. Like it's, it's so individualistic. And I would say when it comes to the shape of a stone,
00:55:23.980like what feels good in your hand is going to feel different in my hand or what feels good
00:55:32.320on your body as, as a pendant or as earrings or as a bracelet is going to feel different
00:55:38.500and, and maybe not good on my body. So like every, everybody is, is so different with it.
00:55:48.380Yeah. I think about that with parenting, you know, the, the advice to really pay attention
00:55:55.060to what your kids are craving. There was a while there where my kid just wanted to eat like
00:56:01.020avocado and coconut oil and, you know, and she was just like drawn to such strange things.
00:56:08.340And I think, I still don't know if this is right, but I had a feeling like, oh, you know, this is a vegan kid due to her allergies. And we hadn't really been paying attention to omega-3s. And I'm seeing her just like kind of manic two-year-old craving for certain things that I think are healthy fats.
00:56:29.860And when we were able to increase those things, like her mood sort of seemed to adjust.
00:56:35.080And I mean, you know, you can't tell anything with a two-year-old, like that could have0.98
00:56:37.940just been a fucking day she was having.0.97
00:56:40.320But I do think listening to what, I do just think like there's a lot to be gained in listening0.98
00:56:49.420to like what my skin wants, what my body wants and what stones I want to pick up and have
00:56:59.860Yeah, I totally agree with it. Like, you know, every day it's, it's different. Like, like today, when I was preparing for this, I was like, well, what, what do I want to have, you know, around me? And what, you know, what did I want to talk about? And, and, you know, this piece, this necklace I have on, move my wire for my earbud.
00:57:22.140so you know we're talking about stones that you know could just be something you pick up in the
00:57:26.600woods so this this stone here um what and this is a piece i haven't worn in a long time i made it
00:57:34.880i think over a decade ago at least yeah at least because it was way before i was pregnant with me
00:57:41.900so um and this stone was given to me by my husband's grandfather and he was um a very
00:57:49.500spiritual man he was a devout pentecostal and he would often say how god would talk to him
00:57:55.680and and he said you know this particular stone and i can tell by the red the red shades in it
00:58:03.260but it has a lot of iron in it clicking um and and it's it's it's about the size of a
00:58:09.520of a squished plum um i'm going to take it off and see if i can make it bigger but anyway
00:58:15.760he um when he was walking the land that he was when he was getting ready to
00:58:24.660build his home he built a little ranch house for um my husband's grandmother and he said when he
00:58:33.720was walking the land um deciding which trees to clear he had picked up the stone and he had this
00:58:39.820had been his worry stone for decades and grandpa and grandma were grandpa passed in 2016 so a month
00:58:50.680before he passed uh he and grandma were married 61 years so this stone is um at least that old
00:59:00.100so i got it when he maybe had it for 50 years um and uh he said one day we were over there visiting
00:59:10.600him and he said he puts the stone in my hand and he said um god told he told me the story of the
00:59:20.660of the stone that i just told you and he said god told me to give it to you because you could do
00:59:25.300something real pretty with it and he said so what's yours and I was like oh no pressure
00:59:31.280um and so I set it in a piece of darkened silver to look like a hand as if you know like how you
00:59:41.580would hold the stone in your hand if you had found it and then since he was talking about clearing
00:59:47.380trees I had all these wood beads and I put 24 karat gold leaf on the edges um and and made this
00:59:56.620made this piece um and and so you know when you talk about stones that have that like this is my
01:00:04.460most prized possession as far as a stone goes um the only other stone that I have that I would I
01:00:13.820would rank that highly is my wedding set which was my grandmother's on my mom's side um she uh
01:00:22.600became a widow at 35 so this is my only connection to my grandfather on my mother's side um and it's
01:00:31.060diamonds and gold uh but i had my husband have it fully restored as my wedding set um so those
01:00:41.660are the two things that are special to me as far as like what I wanted to have on my body today um
01:00:46.960and and so when you when you think about that uh and you think about what what has magic and has
01:00:55.320power um it's really jewelry's ability to connect us to other people you know jewelers not only work
01:01:06.380with metals and stones and and light as i mentioned before but we also work with you know the strange
01:01:12.920invisible world of emotions jewelry is so often given as a love token um whether it's given as
01:01:21.600romantic love or say you know grandma passing something on to you you know while she's still
01:01:27.540here in physical form as opposed to inheriting her her jewelry box you know afterwards after
01:01:35.460she's moved to the spirit world. Um, and, and it's, it, it gives us connection through time
01:01:41.840and space. And so those, those are some of the things that, you know, I think about too. Um,
01:01:49.980and, and I see a question about growing crystals. Oh, growing crystals is fun. Um, there's a ton
01:01:58.640of stuff online for how to grow crystals, but the crystals that you're going to be able to grow
01:02:03.980at home as like a fun science experiment would not are not durable enough to be used as jewelry
01:02:13.300they're very fragile um my daughter actually got a little crystal growing kit um as a gift and so we
01:02:22.780we um made some stuff with it but yeah they're super super fragile but they're cool they're cool
01:02:31.020and there's you can google all kinds of stuff you can grow crystals with epsom salt inside washed
01:02:36.920out eggshells and make your own geodes to teach kids about so just as a fun you know if you've
01:02:43.800got kids and you need something to do with them over a winter break crystal growing would be a
01:02:48.580good thing i love that as a an answer for the kids to our usual question about what's a ritual
01:02:59.560or a practice that we can take from you in this season um but how about for the uh the crones in
01:03:08.060the crowd what's uh what's uh what's a ritual you're working with these days or something that
01:03:15.960can help us grow in our relationship with these ancestors that you spend so much time with
01:03:22.300I would say well I can give you some of my favorite book titles I I you know hashtag read
01:03:34.160all the books um is is my thing um but if you're interested in in lore so you know we're talking
01:03:42.360about Scott Cunningham and his his books are awesome a lot of the books on crystals and
01:03:48.300minerals and how people have used them just kind of have like correspondences to you know
01:03:55.120different healing modalities they don't really get into the the why and the what um
01:04:03.420and so i would recommend books by nicholas pearson because he gets into that he was just on
01:04:11.280um pan grossman's the witch wave podcast not too long ago um and so that was a fascinating listen
01:04:17.520But some of my favorite books, like if you really want to get into more of the lore, I'd like one of my favorites is George Frederick Coons, The Curious Lore of Precious Stones.
01:04:34.880Coons was a gemologist for Tiffany and Company, and he was a prolific writer and researcher.
01:04:41.280and when I looked at a lot of the books on gemstones and crystals and you look in the
01:04:49.600bibliography they all cite him so I'm like well heck with this I'm just going to go to the source
01:04:54.400as close as I could um because he wrote so this book uh when did this come out
01:05:01.340um this one came out in 1913 um and it includes um so here's here's what it says like on the title
01:05:13.600page the curious lore of precious stones being a description of their sentiments and folklore
01:05:19.440superstition symbolism mysticism use in medicine protection prevention religion and divination
01:05:26.500crystal gazing first stones lucky stones and talismans astral zodiacal and planetary so he
01:05:33.760covered it all in this um so this is one i highly recommend i actually got it um from a used um an
01:05:42.940online used book um store and then one of my other favorite ones if you're interested in like alchemy
01:05:50.160um with the mineralogy um gems in myth legend and lore by bruce g knuth um and i'll i'll send
01:06:01.280you all of this so you can link to it um and and i can send you links to like moyo gems and fair
01:06:08.160mind and and various things for like how we talked about recycled gold versus fair mind gold and
01:06:15.640and even the pdf for the um the article i'm reading on gold flows from venezuela but what i
01:06:22.600like about um the gems and myth legend and lore book is each page talks about the crystal system
01:06:30.940for the various stones and also if there is a um alchemical uh symbol for them like an ancient
01:06:40.640alchemy texts. Um, and there's a cool section on, um, like stones mentioned in Shakespeare,
01:06:48.000like how we talked about how different novels and, and writing, um, you know, put different
01:06:54.880properties on stones and then how that, you know, because Shakespeare was so huge, like some of the
01:06:59.840things that he said in his writing became part of the lore of stones, even though he kind of made
01:07:05.760it up sort of kind of you know because everything's based on something else anyway um so there's all
01:07:12.700kinds of cool cool things that just just when you start digging into these and then looking
01:07:17.580in the bibliography you end up down all these wonderful sparkly rabbit holes yes you know we
01:07:25.020are witches who love a bibliography so that's that's key spell casting from michelle for this
01:07:33.860season let's go enjoy pouring over a bibliography and maybe find a stone on the ground is there
01:07:41.880anything else you had uh before we say goodbye and go spin out into our days anything else you
01:07:48.840had in your head or in your heart that you want to kind of pour out into this uh moment
01:07:55.100well i will say i know we've we've hinted at you know maybe once the world is safe to
01:08:05.420for all of us to gather in person um i will kind of just put out there as like some useful
01:08:12.600information um so you know when i sent little may her her birthday treasures um i i google
01:08:20.800map how long would it take for me to drive from your house or from my house to your house
01:08:26.420it's about 10 hours and conveniently situated in the middle is the ace of diamonds mine
01:08:35.360in herkimer new york where i went mining for herkimer diamond quartz crystals
01:08:40.180so um i'm just going to put that out there that perhaps in the hopefully not too distant future
01:08:49.280since that's kind of the midpoint between our two creative spaces, that perhaps a group of us
01:08:57.900can gather there and I can show you how to mine Herkimer quartz crystals. And there is a comment
01:09:10.080in the chat about the Montana sapphires. Yes, Montana sapphires are amazing. If you're looking
01:09:17.660for some phenomenal montana sapphires my friends at columbia gem house um who also do tons of fair
01:09:25.980trade and ethical sourcing with their gems and they cut everything on site um they have a
01:09:32.520beautiful selection of montana sapphires so if you just want to go look at them um i would i would
01:09:39.680highly recommend that but uh i can send you the link for anybody who's interested in a potential
01:09:44.740future herkimer diamond quartz crystal mining adventure i can send you the link for the blog
01:09:52.000post i wrote about what it was like mining those stones that then became the uh the mirror
01:09:57.860collection but there's campgrounds nearby we could have a whole group of us and roast some
01:10:04.200marshmallows and find sparkly stones and just have some good old fun time make a great crystal circle
01:10:13.160in the in the wilderness um put it on your list for the great finding witches missing
01:10:21.560witches road trip of the future um i love the idea amy and i have have an elaborate dream of
01:10:31.360hitting the road and like a string of fine jewels and strange stoves sort of stringing together
01:10:40.000opportunities to sit with all of the incredible inspiring people we've met doing this project
01:10:46.580trying to educate ourselves about the things that we find interesting and
01:10:51.100knowledges we've been missing and the relationships we've been missing
01:10:55.180um so let's let's let's tuck that away like a precious stone in our hearts and uh
01:11:03.300see if at least in imagining it and writing more about it we can get closer to it being true
01:11:08.720thank you for being here. Thank you for doing the work that you do to answer those questions
01:11:16.120that all of our kids will ask us. How was it made and who made it and how are we connected to each
01:11:22.160other? And that's it, I think for today. Yeah. And if anybody, I know anybody listening to this
01:11:37.040who couldn't join in live um if they've got questions you know they can dm me they can
01:11:42.680drop it in comments on patreon like you can find me through my website michellepayjackreynolds.com
01:11:49.420um you know just just reach out we can we can talk sparkles all day let's talk sparkles all day
01:11:57.220thanks everybody thanks for being here bless if i can be0.95