Modern Suiseki

Sado Kinkou-seki

Sado Kinkou-seki. It is a beautiful stone with a certain special quality, often appearing on the covers of books introducing Suiseki and beautiful stones in Japan.

岩谷口：Iwayaguchi

赤玉：Akadama

小倉：Ogura

猿八：Saruhachi

羽茂：Hamochi

Because it is mined from Iwayaguchi in the northeast of Sado Island, it is also known as Iwayaguchi Goshiki or Goshiki Menou(Agate). It is considered the king of beautiful stones, so it may be presumptuous of me to introduce it here, but I would like to offer my own interpretation of it.

Sado Kinkou-seki is extremely rare because it was originally produced in small quantities and mining became impossible in the early 1960s due to the construction of a road around Sado.

The most attractive feature of Kinkou-seki is its complex mixture of colors.

The unique coloring seems to capture a moment when the various colors of paint mix and blend together, eventually disappearing into one single color, and it's rare to see a stone like this anywhere in the world. What's more, the color variation is abundant, with a wide range of reds from pink to deep crimson, as well as black, white, gray, and brown, all intricately intertwined.

Next, the quality of the stone is also excellent. As it is called five-colored agate, the brown, gray, and white areas are transparent and actually allow light to pass through.

In this respect, the opaque jasper and agate sections are intricately intertwined, which brings out the beauty of the ruby.

Although calcified areas do not transmit light, such areas are often removed beforehand.

Sado Kinkou-seki

The deep crimson red in the center of the front and the flowing black, white, and brown colors blend beautifully on both sides. Spherical crystals (spherulites) can be seen in the white sunken areas. Their fine, sparkling shine reveals that they are made of agate. Light also passes through them. Looking closely at the red areas, you can see that a complex, intertwining tile-like pattern of different colors is present.

The area around the bottom right, which is mainly black to brown in color, the area near the top, which is mainly white, and the mix of various colors, mainly red, on the left are beautiful.

A characteristic of Kinkou-seki is that the various colors of paint mix and blend together, eventually disappearing into a single color, creating a color that seems to capture a moment in time.

At first glance, including the spherules in the sunken areas, it appears chaotic, but the more you look, the more different a world you see, and you never get bored. It's like looking at a painting.