Slim Rose Quartz Base Cut Crystal

Most of us find it far easier to be gentle with a friend on a hard day than with ourselves. Rose quartz is a stone for that kindness turned inward, and for love in every other form. Its pink runs from the palest shell to a deep, dusky rose, the shade of a cheek flushed by the fire, and a tumble lies smooth in the palm and slowly takes on your warmth. In Greek myth it belongs to Aphrodite, and her son Eros carried it down to earth so that human hearts would know how to love; Egyptian women used it in their beauty rituals, carved into face masks. We have been reaching for it ever since.

Its home is the Heart Chakra, which the old Hindu and Vedic teachings place at the centre of compassion and the quiet knowing of what we feel.

When anger, resentment, guilt, fear or jealousy have built up, rose quartz is the company we keep while we let those weights go and make space for acceptance, a truer sense of our own worth and a cooler temper. Its traditional associations reach into the body: the heart and circulatory system, the kidneys and fluid balance and, in a long-standing thread, fertility, pregnancy and new family life. Above all it is forgiving. It asks nothing of you first, and stays while you learn to be as gentle with yourself as you are with the people you love.

Every heart, pyramid, angel and point on our shelves was cut and polished from a solid mass, because rose quartz almost never grows as crystals; a rough chunk shows the stone as it leaves the ground. Against the light, rose quartz shows a cloudy glow rather than a clear sparkle. The same tiny inclusions that cloud it also give rose quartz its pink, so the softness comes from the haze as much as from the colour.

On a dresser or beside a mirror, rose quartz is often the first stone our customers see each morning. A piece also sits well beside a gratitude journal, or laid into a crystal grid for a relationship you are tending. You might hold rose quartz for a quiet minute at the start or end of the day, or give a heart to someone you love as a small, solid reminder of it.

Rose quartz (Mohs 7) is hardy, but some pieces pale with long exposure to direct sun, so keep it out of a bright window. Moonlight or sound will clear its energy, and a quick rinse in water is all it needs to come clean.