Why Turquoise Attracts So Many Copies

Turquoise has been prized for thousands of years, and genuine untreated stone of good colour is genuinely rare. That rarity is exactly why markets, seaside gift shops, craft fairs and vintage stalls are full of convincing lookalikes.

The good news is that most dyed copies give themselves away within seconds once you know what to look for. This guide covers three things worth checking first — matrix, colour and surface texture — plus a couple of simple tests you can do politely at a stall.

Reading the Matrix

Matrix is the host rock: the brown, black or grey webbing running through the stone. In genuine turquoise it is usually irregular, tapering and branching unpredictably. It often looks like a fine net or a scatter of veins rather than a neat web, and you may spot tiny grains of surrounding rock or a slightly different texture where a vein meets the turquoise.

Dyed howlite and dyed magnesite are the two most common culprits. Howlite is naturally white with grey-black veins, and after dyeing those veins stay dark while the white body turns blue. The trouble is that the veining often looks sharper, more uniform and more evenly spaced than nature manages.

Magnesite takes dye evenly and is frequently sold with a spiderweb pattern that looks almost printed. If every vein is the same width, the same darkness and the same spacing, be suspicious.

What Colour Should Tell You

Real turquoise ranges from pale sky blue through blue-green to soft green, and it changes across a single stone. Expect patches, gradients, slightly duller areas and a bit of variation between beads on the same strand.

Dyed stones tend to be uniform, and often suspiciously saturated. Deep electric blue running edge to edge with no variation at all is a warning sign.

Another giveaway is where the dye settles. Dye pools in cracks, so the lines through the stone look darker or bluer than the material around them. Real matrix is darker than the turquoise it sits in, but it is generally brown or black rather than blue.

Texture, Weight and Temperature

Genuine turquoise has a waxy to slightly dull lustre. It should not look glassy, and it certainly should not look plastic.

Run your thumb over the surface. Real stone feels cool at first and slightly grippy; resin and plastic warm up quickly and feel slick and light.

Weight matters too. Turquoise is a reasonably dense stone, so a strand of beads should have a satisfying heft. If a piece feels unusually light for its size, think resin — or a hollow-backed setting.

Tap two beads gently together. Real stone gives a soft, high click; plastic and resin thud. On its own this proves little, but combined with what your eyes and hands are telling you, it is a useful check.

The Usual Suspects

• Dyed howlite — white with grey veins, takes blue and green dye beautifully. The veining is usually too regular.
• Dyed magnesite — similar, often with a heavier, blotchier dye and a printed-looking web.
• Reconstituted turquoise — real turquoise dust mixed with resin and pressed. It can look convincing, but it is uniform, has no natural matrix structure and feels lighter than it should.
• Resin and plastic — often with a moulded matrix pattern. Warm to the touch, very light, and the pattern repeats identically from piece to piece.
• Dyed quartzite or serpentine — usually greener, with a grainier texture and dye sitting visibly in the grain.

Worth knowing: stabilised turquoise is real turquoise treated with resin to harden it and hold its colour. That is legitimate and extremely common, and it is not the same thing as dyed or reconstituted stone. Do ask which one you are being offered.

Practical Checks at a Market Stall

Look at the back of the piece, the drill holes and the edges. Dye often stops short, leaving pale grey or white material visible where the stone has been cut or polished.

If you are seriously interested, ask whether you may test a small hidden spot with a dab of acetone or nail polish remover on a cotton bud. Dye will come away on the bud; real stabilised turquoise will not. Always ask permission first, be gentle, and accept a no graciously.

Finally, price. Genuine untreated turquoise in strong blue is not cheap, and a stall selling perfect colour and a neat web at £4 a strand is almost certainly selling dyed howlite. That said, stabilised turquoise, paler and greener grades, and small cabochons can be genuinely affordable, so a low price is not proof of fakery by itself.

Trust your eye, buy from sellers who will talk you through a stone's origin and treatment, and build your collection slowly. The pieces you keep will be the ones you chose carefully.