Moonstone Guide- What's real, what's not.

Moonstone is a beautiful and popular gemstone. It is often sold in jewellery or bead format. It is usually quite expensive which is why duplicates or man-made variants are made and sold. Here I will show you how to identify genuine moonstone and the common "fake" moonstone, sea opal or opalite.A lot of the "moonstone" being sold on ebay is in actual fact, not moonstone at all. A lot of it is a man made glass being sold as Moonstone. This man made stone is actually something called "Sea Opal" or "Opalite". It is a man-made glass that has a similar look to moonstone.How can you tell the difference?Well, Moonstone and opalite both have very distinctive looks and properties. You can easily distinguish between the two stones.Opalite or Sea Opal is man made glass. It has no inclusions and the only imperfections you may see are bubbles inside the bead or pendant, from the manufacturing process. They are usually a milky blue-white colour and depending on the cut, can give off a beautiful colour play of purples, blues, and yellows. Opalite is cheap. It is a relatively low-priced man made gemstone, but since it is often mistaken for real moonstone, the price is put up to match that of the genuine moonstone. These are Opalite or Sea Opal: Moonstone is natural, so it has inclusions or noticeable imperfections due to its natural make-up. These might be crystal inclusions, black spots or rough edges. There are various colours and forms of moonstone. Two of the most common are regular moonstone and rainbow moonstone.Moonstone has a beautiful shimmer of light in all its forms and almost has a fibre -optic effect. It can sometimes look like catseye.Moonstone is also a relatively soft gemstone, ranking at only 6 on the Mohs scale. It needs to be treated delicately and carefully. Moonstone should look translucent milky white and should have a constantly moving iridescence. Rainbow moonstone has all these properties plus a beautiful blue "flash" that changes colour in the light from purple to pinks back to blues.These are pictures of genuine Moonstone: