Garnet is the birthstone of January. Although many people think of a red gem when they think of garnet, it is actually available in almost every color – green (tsavorite and demantoid), orange (spessartine and hessionite), purple (rhodolite), yellow (mali and topazolite), pink (malaya), red (almandine and pyrope), black (melanite). These are just some of garnet’s many colors and varieties. There are even opaque garnets that are usually cut as a cabochon (pink hydrogrossular and green grossularite). The color variety of garnet gives people born in January many color options.

The accompanying photo shows some of the many different colors in which garnet can occur. Top row, from left to right: orange spessartite (Mozambique), yellow mali (Mali), green demantoid (Namibia). Middle row: green tsavorite (Tanzania), purple rhodolite (Mozambique), pink malaya (Tanzania). Bottom row: red pyrope (Cote d’Ivoire), green merelani mint (Tanzania), orange hessonite (Sri Lanka). Except for the orange hessonite from Sri Lanka, all of these garnets were mined in Africa, the relatively new source of spectacular garnets.