About the word “ethical”

There is no Kimberley Process for quartz. The Responsible Jewellery Council's 2024 code reaches ruby, sapphire and emerald and stops there. Nothing certifies rose quartz, amethyst, selenite or fluorite end to end, and anyone offering you a logo for it is selling you a logo.

Roughly eighty percent of the world's colored stone comes out of artisanal and small-scale mining — the part of this industry with the least paperwork and the most people in it. That is the trade we are in, not a footnote to it.

So we do not ask you to be certified. We ask you to be answerable: who dug it, who sold it to you, and whether you can still get a straight answer three links back. Where we cannot get that answer, we say so on the card rather than dressing it up.