Most people arrive knowing roughly what they want — a cuff, a ring, something blue — and leave having learned that the stone was the real decision. Turquoise from different mines does not vary a little; it varies enough that a Sleeping Beauty piece and a Royston piece look like different materials altogether. These pages let you shop by the stone itself rather than by the shape of the piece.
The Arizona mines are the ones most people have heard of. Sleeping Beauty is the clean, even sky blue with almost no matrix — that mine stopped producing turquoise in 2012, so what exists is all there will ever be. Kingman is still actively mined and is the one we can most reliably restock. Bisbee and Morenci are older, finite and collected. All four sit together on our Arizona turquoise page.
Nevada brings the character stones. Royston shifts blue to green inside a single cabochon over heavy golden-brown host; boulder turquoise keeps the host rock as part of the design; Dry Creek formed with so little copper it came out nearly white; white buffalo is bright white with hard black webbing. Sonoran turquoise comes up from Mexico, and Golden Hills from Kazakhstan — a pale powder blue with a fine chocolate web unlike any American material.
Not everything here is turquoise. Opal brings the flash that turquoise cannot, lapis lazuli the deepest blue with flecks of gold pyrite, and black onyx the dark field that makes every other colour read. Red coral and spiny oyster shell supply the warm reds and oranges that have partnered turquoise in Navajo and Zuni work for centuries.
Everything across these pages is handmade with natural stones and set in sterling silver or 14K gold, and much of it is one of a kind. If you want the background before you choose, the Turquoise Guide covers the mines, what stabilised really means, and how to buy with confidence. Silver Star Jewelry is family owned in Old Town Scottsdale — 7257 East First Ave, (480) 949-1101, open every day. Free US shipping over $99.