Why Verde Guatemala Usually Comes From India
There was a green slate and chlorite schist once mined near Passabia and the de las Minas in Guatemala though. But when the country fell into civil war, the supply stopped, and the name "Verde Guatemala" went on an epic journey looking for a new host. It wound up finding one in Rajasthan, India. There was a dense green stone from the quarries around Udaipur that looked close enough to pass for the original thing. For a while, the distinction between Verde Guatemala and Indian Guatemala mattered, but with such a steady supply, one overtook the other. Today, when designers spec Verde Guatemala, or Guatemala Green, what will arrive is more than likely coming from India.
Stone names have become more commercial addresses than descriptions over time really. They record where a trade route once went and what a buyer once wanted, which is more of a statement about culture and heritage than it is about rocks.
How to Read the Story Inside a Slab of Stone
Now, if we're talking about stones themselves, reading them is like reading a poneglyph in Skypeia. Difficult at first. But if you allow someone who knows the language to guide you through it, the story begins to reveal itself.
You start with the veins. Veins in stone are misunderstood because of how beautiful they are. But veins are remnants of change for a stone. Every line that runs through a slab marks a place where the stone broke, and mineral-rich fluids filled those fractures under heat and pressure.
Calacatta Viola and the Drama of the Apuan Alps
Take Calacatta Viola, out of the Apuan Alps above Tuscany, the same range that produced Michelangelo's greatest works. That location is known for its Carrara; however, Calacatta and Carrara are grades and pattern differences rather than materials born from separate mountains. Those beautiful burgundy and plum currents that run through the Calacatta are a cocktail of manganese and iron oxide that poured into its fractures while the stone was still under strain, permanently staining it for our visual pleasure. A slab of Calacatta Viola is a slab of romantic drama that played out over an unhurried millennium.
Rosso Levanto and the Beauty of Being Reborn
Rosso Levanto makes a similar speech but with a far more bold and bombastic rhythm. It comes from the Ligurian coast around the town of Levanto. It adopted the name but kept its proud heritage as a primary stone that the Romans were cutting into columns, floors, and wall facings to adorn its most important architecture. When you look at this stone, the deep red is suspended in a web of white calcite, forming a breccia - the formation of a stone that was shattered but then brought back together in combination with another mineral in a kind of polymerization; not two individual pieces together, but one new thing with a life all its own.
Guatemala Green’s Journey From Seabed to Rajasthan
And the "Guatemala Green" from Udaipur has the most remarkable journey of the three because its origins are from beneath the ocean floor where it was hydrated by seawater and turned green through the alchemy of chemistry as it rode continental collisions upward over millions of years until it surfaced in Rajasthan. And then eventually in the homes of some of the most tastefully inclined.
So the next time you look at Verde Guatemala, or "Guatemala Green," stone, remember it's an act of God, expressed through nature, as a piece of former seabed was broken and rebuilt by water, and presented to mankind thanks to two continents refusing to be without each other.
Choosing Stone by More Than its Name
That's three stones with three very distinguishing events.
The practical use of knowing this history makes you that much more confident when selecting the stone that you want to represent you in your home. When people ask you, "Is that Marble?" you'll have more to offer than just a yes or no and a name.
Because the name tells them who the stone is.
Everything else you say after that tells them who you are.
The stones featured throughout this story include Calacatta Viola, Rosso Levanto, and Guatemala Green. Images courtesy of the public domain. This story is part of Residence Supply’s Power of Imagination campaign.
