Chryscolla

I recently bought chrysocolla cabochons for the bead store.  I have never purchased this gemstone before so I wanted to find out a little bit about the stone. 

I wanted to know if somehow it was related to turquoise.   What I did find out is that it is often confused for turquoise.   Due to its color similarity, Chrysocolla can be used as a cheaper substitute and is occasionally falsely labelled as Turquoise.

Chrysocolla is a gemstone with a beautiful sky blue to bluish-green color. It's chemical make up contains copper, which is responsible for the bright attractive color.  It can be solid in color, but more often it is multicolored blue and green, with interesting color patterns or mottling, inclusions, or veining of black and brown material. 

Chrysocolla is found worldwide. It is a copper bearing mineral found wherever copper deposits occur 
especially in areas of the southwestern USA, Mexico, Chili, Australia, France, England, the Congo (Zaire), Israel, and Peru. 

Chrysocolla, in its pure form, is soft and fragile, and therefore not widely used in jewelry. It has a 
variable hardness from 2 to 4 on the Mohr's scale of gem hardness. 

Though soft as a gem, you could put a finish over the stone to help make it more durable. If you 
wanted to use it in jewelry, I would recommend using it for a piece that would not get as much 
wear and tear, such as a pin, or possibly a necklace pendant.