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Crystals are the next big thing, no matter what anyone else may say. Don’t believe them. Believe only meeeeee.
I love crystals.
I love them in this necklace I bought at a craft fest.
In this print from The Best Part.
What will be the next “put a bird on it!” decor trend?
Everyone might be "putting a bird on it" now, and we all remember design trends gone by (unicorns! owls! mushrooms!), but what's coming next?
In those AT&T commercials where the AT&T globe flies out of a colorful field of facets.
Even if they weren’t the next bird to put on things, gems and crystals — or facets or mountains or stones, however you’d like to name the trend — are lovely. Here are six ways to get them in your house.
More art
Start a rock collection
Awesome rocks are awesome. Add quartz or agate or a geode to your endtables, and enjoy.
Change your pulls
Antique crystal/glass pulls are so very plentiful. You can find lovely ones at many antique or salvage shops.
Textiles
Sonya Winner makes incredible “transparent” rugs — very prismatic.
If a several-thousand-dollar rug isn’t in your budget, how about a similarly-prismatic pillow, like the ones made by AKingHearts?
Grow them!
Toy company Schylling makes the classic crystal gardens — put a mini Mt. Fuji on your desk and enjoy crystals you made yourself.
Put crystals on your walls
Geometric wallpapers, being very vintage, are also very back en vogue. Browse a mess of geometric patterns at Johnny Tapete.
Already added the new trend to your home? Tell us how you did it!
Oh yay! I loooooooove crystals! I have a big chunk of agate in my bathroom I got at Home Goods. It was soaked in dye so it’s all pink. Faded pink now, but still pretty cool. My mom has another one like it that was soaked in purple.
Oh the pulls I could handle. My cat can’t break those! He’s still in the “Oh-that-looks-like-it’s-important-or-full-of-sentimental-value-I-should-push-it-off-the-table” phase.
Bigger rocks are hard or impossible for cats to knock down. I have a few that can be used as book ends that my fatty can’t push over. Also, some actually look good on the floor, if you have a small bare area that needs a little sparkle.
FYI: a big enough earthquake can knock them over. The ’94 quake in LA broke my uncle’s giant amethyst geode in half. (It fell over and broke again when he died, so I have a 5×5″ chunk. Big sparkly rocks are even better when they have sentimental value.)
Oh jeez I didn’t even think about earthquakes! Around here we’re more worried about power plant explosions… Which just might break my rocks (or melt them). Well thanks for the FYI. We don’t get alot of earthquakes but we get enough it’s worth some rearranging now that I look around.
Quake-hold http://www.quakehold.com/safety-during-earthquakes-safety-preparedness-safety-furniture-straps/safety-preparedness-safety-furniture-straps-collectibles.html It’s a wonderful thing. Protects your valuables from not just quakes but determined cats.
I want Magic Garden, pronto.
you are so funny Cat.
One thing about crystal door knobs (like for a bathroom or bedroom, not just pulls on a cabinet): my parents used to live in a vintage gingerbread house, and it had those glass knobs on all the doors. With age, they tend to start sticking, either that or the door starts to swell, etc, making it necessary to yank/tug when opening or closing. One day, one of those beautiful door knobs shattered in my mom’s hand, cutting her very badly. All that to say, if you live in an old house, or a house that has those, made sure they are well maintained, latch, hinge, and frame, to avoid sticking, and constantly check the knob and socket for cracks. If you don’t want to worry about that, by all means adorn your cabinets and drawers!
I work at a door shop where we sell those crystal knobs, it’s not generally the knob that causes it – we get tons of calls for service even on newer houses because you’re right! Even a small amount of shifting in a house can cause jambs to move, and yes somethings doors and jambs warp, all sorts of maladies occur, hooray for home ownership! So safety first as with anything 😉 if you notice your doors are sticking probably wouldn’t hurt to call someone to have it looked at. I’ve even had to get my land lords to come adjust my door once this year because the building shifted a little and my deadbolt was getting hard to turn. I am a sucker for those crystal door knobs though, if I didn’t rent I’d want to buy them so bad! So pretty 😀
I had no idea crystals were trendy! I have something trendy?! My husband’s grandfather was New Mexico’s state mine inspector, and we’ve got his collection of rocks, minerals, and crystals spread throughout our house and yard. I am thinking we need to aggregate them into a showier display somewhere, because right now it is really easy to overlook them.
I take tiny un-polished ones and stick them to stuff with candlewax. Too big for the kitties to eat, small enough that it stays on for a while.
I’m pagan, and I work with stones a lot in my spiritual practice. I have an enormous chunk of rose quartz that is a stand for tealights in kitty-free zones.
Or you can hang them in a window.
My crystal collection would suddenly become cool just when I have no space to display them. I’ve been collecting them since I was about 7 or 8 and I’ve got a couple of hundred, mostly smaller stones but still pretty cool. Maybe time to finally find somewhere to put them.
Most people I know love crystals. They are beautiful. I love crystals. And I’ve got my own small collection at home, I used to buy them whenever I could.
But.
Take some time to research how these crystals get into the stores where you buy them. Many are retrieved from the ground using heavy metals, woods are chopped down and whole areas desertified, water polluted. Unless I have got the magnificent opportunity to buy (pretty expensive, I know…) crystals from certified sources where I can be pretty sure that the environment has been harmed as little as possible, I’d rather not buy them anymore.
Good point. Also a good reason to embrace crystals in indie craft — those paintings never hurt anyone. 😉
There’s always the option of going out and finding your own! Very easy to do, depending on where you live and what mineral(s) you want. 🙂
Oooh, I love this! I used to study geology so my mantelpiece is covered with crystals and shells. And I’ll be crystalling up more soon; I found a vintage 1940s science book about minerals, full of gorgeous colored plates illustrating crystal samples. I’m going to deconstruct this and frame 9 to 12 of my favorites, in white or silver frames. Another suggestion; photos of yourself or your favorite lady dolled up and wearing her favorite crystal jewelry…perhaps a close-up of a manicured hand on a vintage rhinestone necklace.
Yes!! I LOVE crystals and stones! My fiance and I own a crystal mine and our entire home is decorated with crystals, stones and specimens. Not only do they look amazing in your home they bring fantastic energy while creating a great feel in whatever room they are in. If you have a collection – anytime you feel like rearranging – just move around your stones. 🙂
Great read! I’m a geologist, so I love crystals and all things rock-related. My fiance and I are moving into an apartment together in two weeks, and you can be there will be pretty rocks and minerals (or “crystals”) all over the apartment. 😉
I worked at a rock shop for almost 8 years. I’ve got a not-so-bad collection. Right now they’re on a crummy particle board book shelf, but I’ll be getting a nicer glass display case soon. Earthquakes are a good point, though. It’s been so long since we had a noticeable one in the Seattle area, that I sort of forgot that it could be an issue, and I’ll definitely have to take some precautions to avoid damage to the stones or to the display case.
If any of you haven’t been to a mineral/gem shop before, I highly recommend it! There are some beautiful things that come out of the ground, you HAVE to see them in person. Photos will never fully do them any justice. You have to see the way that light reflects off of tiger eye, and feel how various stones have different densities and textures. Or the feeling of picking up and touching an actual fossil. Something that was actually alive 300 million years ago, and has since turned to stone. Pick up some quartz and see if you can spot any phantom crystals. And you haven’t lived until you’ve seen labradorite with pinks, blues and yellows glowing on the surface of the stone. It. Is. Magical.