Alexandrite is a pleasingly gentle color and is notorious for confusing beaders with its ability to change from shades of sapphire to shades of lavender depending on what type of light shines on it. Regular indoor lighting can sometimes make it difficult for customers to tell alexandrite apart from light sapphire (color #3001). When in doubt, we recommend taking the beads outside into direct sunlight or near a bright window.

Getting the beads to display the way you want them to in a photo can also prove to be difficult. Daylight fluorescent bulbs are an ideal light source for taking accurate product shots, but they can only show one side of alexandrite.

The contrast between the two variations is so striking that it is very difficult to switch one to the other by attempting drastic adjustments in Photoshop.

To get the deep brilliance to show you may need to play around with your camera's white balance settings. The purple versions of these pictures were taken under halogen lighting with the white balance of the camera set to incandescent. The pictures were then modified and adjusted slightly in Photoshop.