It could be argued that the Munich Show is the largest single mineral show on the planet. Unlike Tucson, which is made up of numerous different shows spread all over town, Mineralientage Munchen is organized each year by a single promoter, Johannes Keilmann and his son, and held at a single venue, the new Munich Messestadt (conference center) in three huge adjacent halls. Included under one roof is everything from high-end to wholesale minerals, jewelry and beads, lapidary, fossils, crystal healing/metaphysical stuff, and a biergarten. It is Germany, after all! And unlike Tucson, the Munich show is only three days long (well, four or five if you can get a pass to get in during setup days).
It is always easy to find reasons to stay home - bad exchange rate, long airline flights, different language, blah, blah, blah! If one thinks too hard about such things then one might never even get out of bed in the morning, let alone do something interesting with one's time! So there we were, an overnight flight from California drops us off at the Munich airport on a cold wet morning in late October. The train from the airport into Munich delivers us almost to the door of our temporary residence, the Hotel Exquisit near the Sendlinger Tor in the city center. It's still too early to check into our room, but not too late to grab a traditional Bavarian breakfast (Bayrisches Fruhtucke) of weisswurste, weissebier and a pretzel. By tradition, this is served only until noon, so we make it to one of our favorite Munich stops, the Weisses Brauhaus, home of the incredible Schneider Weisse wheat beer. Sausage and beer makes an excellent breakfast, particularly when one has been up for almost 24 hours already, and with that taken care of we then head to the nearby Viktualienmarkt - Munich's incredible open-air produce market for some shopping and sight-seeing. By mid-afternoon the breakfast had worn off and the effects of a 9-hour time zone change were taking hold so it was back to the hotel for a rest.
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The Marienplatz, center of Munich's Altestadt (old town). (left) - A good weissbier takes the edge off the jetlag (right).
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East entrance to the Messe, a very modern building complex on the site of the old airport (left) - The cavernous Hall A5 contains most of the retail mineral dealers, while wholesale dealers were found in the adjacent Hall A6 (right).
Bright and early the next morning we caught the U-Bahn (underground train) out to the Messe and met our friend Jurgen Margraf, who had official badges, allowing us to get in and help him setting up his booth. A good part of that help entailed delivering some new Rogerley fluorite from last summer's mining for its debut at the show. Cal and Kerith were also attending this year's show and we all gathered at Jurgen's booth with our respective specimens. About the time we had finished pricing and arranging the fluorite in Jurgen's display he brought in about 20 flats containing a collection of material from Erongo, Namibia that he and his partner Gerhard had just purchased. It's not very often that we find ourselves getting to be the first to go through a fairly major collection being put up for sale, but this time we were in the right place at the right time. Sadly, the available funds were not able to cover but a minor fraction of what was being offered, but we did manage to come away with a few nice things, including some intense green fluorite clusters and a nice miniature-sized spray of bicolor beryl crystals with small fluorites at the base. And so it goes - most of one's cash is blown within hours of the opening of the show. Easy to do at a show like this one!
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A selection of Rogerley fluorite from 2008 (left) - Jurgen Margraf's impressive "Wall of Glass" display (right).
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Erongo specimens: beryl with fluorite, 5 cm across (left) - fluorite on microcline, 8 cm across (right).
By the time we finished working our way through the flats word had filtered out of its presence and others, including American dealers Bill Larson, Mike Bergmann and Rob Lavinsky began stopping by. The "Bush Telegraph" works very quickly at shows like this. So as to get out of the way of further business for Jurgen and Gerhard, we set aside our selections and ventured forth to see some of the rest of the show, only then realizing that we had actually spent much of the day on the Erongo collection alone. With time getting on, we headed for the "International Pavilion," which is a grouping of dealers who specialize in the high quality and high price stuff, located at the head of the hall. Dealers in this section include Kristalle and Crystal Classics, the Gobins, Francois Leitard, Andreas Weerth, Frederic Escaut, Marcus Grossmann, Marcus Budil, and others. For the past several years this mineralogical "ghetto" has been decorated with a large white canvas funnel-shaped thing suspended from the roof. I've taken to calling this thing the "money funnel" - one pours money into the funnel and fantastic minerals flow out from below. No joke! There were some fantastic minerals there at fantastic prices. Even if one can not afford five-figure 15 cm bicolor Afghani tourmalines on matrix every day, they sure are fun to see. And the upside of the high valuations on such specimens is that they are now being preserved for themselves rather than being broken up for gem and carving rough.
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The Money Funnel hovers over the International Pavilion like some strange UFO waiting to beam up unsuspecting collectors (left) - Some of the attractive goodies on display are an enticing lure (right).
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A collector/potential victim wanders the corridors of the pavillion (left) - For the survivors of the ordeal there is plenty of champagne at the concession (right).
As much as all the specimens in the International Pavillion are wonderful eye candy, I found a sameness to most of the dealer's stock. Lots of Pakistani aquamarines, colorful tourmalines from Afghanistan and Brazil, large Afghani kunzites, Chinese scheelites, fluorites and stibnites, the occasional Tsumeb dipotase, azurite or cerussite, or a Red Cloud wulfenite. What I would call the mineral kingdom's "greatest hits." Not that I would mind having a few of these were they affordable, and there was a really cute little Pakistani aqua and schorl combination for only 12,500 Euros, but after a little while I found the lack of diversity somewhat boring. Fortunately, one can usually find an antidote for this in the Kristalle/Crystal Classics booth. These folks specialize in acquiring and distributing old collections and as a result will usually have a nice selection of old classics mixed in with modern wonders. The cases were arranged according to nationality, and included some choice things from Germany, France, England, and the USA. I recall a couple really nice Egremont calcites that, sadly, the budget would not allow for this year. An added benefit of hanging around their booth (aside from the danger to one's bank balance) is that we can usually mooch a glass of wine from Ian at the end of a hard day on one's feet.
One thing I've come to realize after collecting for about 30 years is that we as collectors often tend to discount mineral specimens that are abundant, thinking them commonplace and not appreciating how unique they may be. I recall this being the case with things like Mexican adamite and Tsumeb dipotase in the 1970s and Illinios fluorite in the 1980s. The stuff was everywhere and prices were cheap. Not any more, the mines close and good pieces quickly become both scarce and expensive. I think a current example are the Pakistani aquamarines. They're literally everwhere one looks at a show like Munich. They're also incredibly good on a world-wide scale. If one could not afford the prices in the International Pavillion, just next door was a section for "Guests from Overseas," which was inhabited by numerous dealers from Pakistan and Afghanistan, who were offering dozens, if not hunderds of such aqua specimens of all qualities and prices. If one was willing to bargain and capable of doing some trimming and cleaning some really attractive specimens could be had at reasonable prices. Also abundant this year, and scattered amongst several dealers in both Hall 5 and 6 were the attractive red tourmalines from the Malkhan pegmatites in the Transbaikal region of Russia. What was said to have been the best specimen of the season was quite expensive but other nice pieces were much less so. On the "buyer beware" side, it seems that someone has figured out how to darken the sherry-colored Pakistani topaz specimens with irradiation. No reports yet on how stable the color is.
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A nice Pakistani aquamarine on quartz (left) - Another, associated with apatite on microcline (right).
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A very nice bicolor tourmaline with quartz and lepidolite from the Malkhan pegmatites, Russia. I'm told this was the best one of the season. Others were less expensive. (left) - An irradiated topaz crystal, reportedly from Pakistan (right).
In the evening we headed off to a fairly new place, Der Pschorr, located on the edge of the Viktualienmarkt, near our hotel. Der Pschorr is essentially a modernized version of a traditional Bavarian beerhall somewhat in the same fashion as the gastropubs that have recently sprung up around London - a traditional concept serving really good food. As with many other countries, smoking bans in public places are begining to happen in Germany, which added greatly to an enjoyable evening. Next day at the show, with funds largely depleted, we took in the displays and some of the "alternative" exhibits. The theme for this year's displays was Australia and was organized by Penny Willimson from the museum at the University of Wollongong, Australia. Penny was also the organizer of the displays for the Australia theme at Tucson a year and a half back. I would have thought she would have had enough of it after that, but fortunately for the rest of us, she appears to be a glutton for punishment and took it on a second time. The Australian golds were amazing and the display was so popular that it was difficult to get close enough for a good look (or to take a decent photo).
After that we took in the hall with the wholesale dealers, collector's exhibits, and metaphysical stuff. One thing that quickly became clear is that the bright orange spessartines from Tanzania, which debuted last Tucson at very high prices, are present in great abundance. I think that anyone who held off buying one before because of the prices may find it more to their liking in the near future. As one has come to expect, there were many Chinese dealers offering tables full of the same well-oiled fluorite specimens we've seen before. I saw one large (maybe 6 cm) well-formed purple fluorite penetration twin from Yaogangxian that was so dinged up and oil coated that I wanted to cry for it! I did find one very interesting Chinese fluorite, however. It is a twin with quartz from the Dayu Mine. The main part of the crystal is a milky blue-white, but the crystal is partially overgrown with a rind of dark purple that overlaps some of the crystal edges. It looks like it was dipped in purple chocolate. Also of interest to the fluorite fanatics was an exhibit featuring specimens from the latest issue of Extra-Lapis on fluorite. Prominently displayed was the cover piece, a cluster of bright yellow fluorite cubes with a scattering of siderite on matrix, from Aouli, Morocco. Good thing it wasn't for sale or some serious deficit spending may have occurred. On the plus side, our recent finds at the Rogerley did get featured in the Extra-Lapis issue.
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Another round of beers on it's way at Der Pschorr (left) - A customer gets an impromptu serenade (right).
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An interesting penetration twinn fluorite with quartz, 5 cm across, from the Dayu Mine, China (left) - A wonderful fluorite from Aouli, Morocco, which is featured on the cover of the latest Extra-Lapis issue (right).
At the back of Hall 6 was the "Wellness Insel," which featured lectures and demonstrations on various topics such as hot stone massage and re-aligning one's chakras with gemstones, a bar for tasting elixers of gemstone-infused water, and someone's interpretation of what the Garden of Eden may have been like. Sadly, no naked women with apples were evident, but there was a dark pond that featured purple lighted burbelling fountains spewing a ground-hugging mist. Very primeval in a sort of clean and high-tech way. After all that excitement, the only thing one could do was to retire to the biergarten with friends for some refreshment.
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The "Garten von Eden" at the "Wellness Insel" in Hall 6 (left) - The primeval swamp in the center of the garden featuring purple-lighted, mist-spewing fountains (right).
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The biergarten is always a popular place and I suspect they took in more money than many dealers (left) - After a hard day of shopping a half liter of helles or weissbier is just the thing (right).
To conclude, I would say that Munich is a wonderful place to visit and that Mineralientage Munchen is one of the world's premier mineralogical events. If you like minerals and haven't been to the show, the only thing I can say is "why not?" No excuse will do. So, until Tucson...
Auf Wiedersehen und Gluck Auf.
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