Materials

Every Lomāe piece begins with the stone. The shape, the surface, the way light catches an edge — all of it is dictated by what the material can do, and what it cannot.

This page is the long answer to the questions we get most often. What each stone is. Where it comes from. How it formed. Why we chose it for the pieces we make.

It is also written to be honest about what each material is not. Stone is not a single thing. The word "marble" covers a hundred geological cousins, and the word "travertine" covers stones that look, feel and behave differently depending on where the block came from. We have tried to tell the truth about that here.

On this page

• Materials at a glance
• Spanish Alabaster
• Crema Marfil
• Beige Travertine
• Yellow Travertine
• Silver Grey Travertine
• Calacatta Viola
• How we source
• Choosing the right stone for your space
• Care, in brief
• Frequently asked questions

Materials at a glance

Mohs hardness is a 1 to 10 scale. Talc is 1, diamond is 10. A fingernail is roughly 2.5. Most household objects sit between 4 and 7. Stone in the 3 to 4 range is workable, holds detail well, and survives normal use, but is not indestructible.

Spanish Alabaster

A translucent mineral, soft in the hand, glowing under light.

What it is

Spanish alabaster is not, strictly speaking, a stone. It is a gypsum mineral, a hydrated calcium sulphate, formed in shallow inland seas that evaporated tens of millions of years ago. The deposits in Aragon, in northern Spain, are among the largest and finest in the world. They have been quarried since at least Roman times, and the material has been used in cathedral windows, funerary sculpture and royal commissions for centuries.

Alabaster is often confused with marble. They are unrelated. Marble is metamorphic limestone; alabaster is a soft evaporite. The two stones look similar at first glance because both can be carved to a fine surface and both take a polish, but they handle, age and behave entirely differently.

The defining property of alabaster is translucency. A thin section of Spanish alabaster, lit from behind, glows. A candle behind a 6mm wall reveals the structure of the mineral itself: the cloud-like banding, the inclusions, the way light slows down inside it. No other natural stone does this in the same way.

Working properties

Mohs hardness 2. This is roughly the hardness of a fingernail, which is why alabaster can be carved with hand tools and why it scratches if treated carelessly. It is also water-soluble over time. Sustained exposure to water dissolves the surface; vinegar or citrus does it faster.

This is not a flaw. Alabaster has been used for indoor sculptural work for two thousand years precisely because it carves so beautifully. The rules for living with it are clear: keep it dry, keep it out of direct kitchen and bathroom use, and treat it as the indoor object it is.

In our collection

We use Spanish alabaster for The Vesper candle vessel and The Reveal display piece. Both are designed to be lit. The wall thickness on The Vesper is calibrated so that a single candle inside produces the full translucent glow without overheating the rim.

Why we chose it

Most premium homeware brands ignore alabaster because it requires the customer to understand the material. We chose it because there is no substitute for what it does with light. A travertine candle holder is a candle holder; an alabaster candle vessel is a piece that disappears when unlit and becomes the centrepiece of a room when lit. The difference matters.

Crema Marfil

A cream marble with the softest veining of any stone we use.

What it is

Crema Marfil is a beige marble from the Sierra del Algayat range in the Alicante region of Spain. The name is a protected geographical indication: a marble called Crema Marfil is, by trade definition, Spanish. Other regions produce visually similar beige marbles (Crema Valencia, Botticino from Italy, Galala from Egypt), but they are not interchangeable.

Geologically, Crema Marfil is a sedimentary marble formed from compacted limestone roughly 130 million years ago. The cream colour comes from iron oxide content; the soft, blurred veining comes from interbedded clays and the way the original sediment settled. Pinoso, the town at the centre of the quarry region, has been producing this stone commercially for over a century.

The best Crema Marfil blocks are pale, even, and fine-grained, with veining that reads as a whisper rather than a statement. Lower grades show heavier brown veining and irregular patches. We work with the finer grades because the pieces we make are quiet by intent.

Working properties

Mohs hardness 3 to 4. Polishes brilliantly. Holds carved detail well. Like all calcium-carbonate marbles, it will etch when exposed to acids — wine, citrus, vinegar, coffee, some cleaning products. The etching is not a stain; it is a soft chemical mark where the acid has dissolved a microscopic amount of the surface. It can be re-polished by a specialist, but in honest use most owners come to read the etching as part of the stone's life. We do too.

In our collection

We use Crema Marfil for The Waitākere, an irregular bowl carved from a single block. The piece is named for the ranges west of Auckland, where the stone we picked first reminded us of the colour of dry summer grass on the hills above Karekare.

Why we chose it

Cream is the most difficult colour in stone. Too pale and it reads cold; too warm and it reads dated. Crema Marfil sits exactly where a cream marble should sit: warm enough to soften a room, cool enough to hold its own against pale linens and natural timber. The veining is soft enough to live with for years without going out of fashion.

Beige Travertine

The most honest of stones. A working material made beautiful.

What it is

Travertine is a sedimentary stone, formed when calcium-bearing groundwater rises through hot springs and deposits dissolved minerals as it cools. The Romans built the Colosseum from it; most of central Rome's classical architecture is travertine from the quarries at Tivoli, where the stone has been worked for over two thousand years.

Beige travertine is the most common variety. The blocks we use come from quarries in central Italy and western Turkey, both regions with significant geothermal activity and long quarrying traditions. The two origins produce subtly different stones: Italian beige tends to be paler and more even; Turkish beige is often slightly warmer with more visible banding.

The defining character of travertine is its porosity. Travertine forms in layers, and gas bubbles trapped during deposition leave visible pores and voids in the finished block. These can be filled at the factory (a process called "filled travertine") or left open (called "unfilled" or "honed open-pore"). Both are correct; both are travertine. We work with both depending on the piece.

Working properties

Mohs hardness 3 to 4. Softer than granite, harder than alabaster. Travertine is porous, so it is sealed before it leaves us, but the seal is a treatment, not a permanent property of the stone. A piece in regular use should be resealed every twelve to eighteen months with a quality penetrating stone sealer.

Unsealed travertine will absorb liquids and stain. This is not a fault; it is the nature of the material. Roman travertine floors and fountains have stained, weathered and patinated over millennia, and the result is the material at its most beautiful. But on a piece you live with, sealing slows that process to a manageable pace.

In our collection

We use beige travertine for The Cornice shelf object and The Joint sculptural piece. Both are pieces designed to sit, not to hold liquids, so the porosity of the material is a visual choice rather than a functional concern.

Why we chose it

Travertine is the stone that does not pretend. The pores are visible. The banding is visible. The hand-finishing is visible. In a category dominated by perfectly uniform polished stones, travertine is honest in a way that suits the pieces we make. It is also a stone with two thousand years of design history behind it, which is the kind of pedigree that does not need explaining.

Yellow Travertine

The rarer travertine, with the warmth of weathered brass.

What it is

Yellow travertine is the same geological material as beige travertine, but with a higher concentration of iron oxide compounds in the original groundwater. The result is a stone with golden, honeyed, sometimes almost amber tones, often with pronounced horizontal banding from the way the stone deposited in layers.

The best yellow travertine comes from Iran (where it is called Travertino Persa Gold or Yellow Persian) and from quarries in central and southern Turkey. Iranian yellow has the deepest colour and the most pronounced banding; Turkish yellow tends to be paler and more even. Both are sometimes referred to in trade as "gold travertine" or "honey travertine," which are marketing names, not geological ones.

Yellow travertine is less common than beige because the colour palette is narrower and the deposits are smaller. It is also a stone that can read as either timeless or dated depending on context, which makes selection harder. We work with restrained, even blocks, avoiding the heavily banded variants that tip into orange or rust.

Working properties

Identical to beige travertine. Mohs hardness 3 to 4. Porous, sealed, requires resealing in regular use. One additional note: yellow travertine is more sensitive to UV exposure than the beige variants. Prolonged direct sunlight can fade the warmer tones over many years. For a piece on a sunlit windowsill, expect very gradual change. For a piece on an interior shelf, the colour will hold.

In our collection

We use yellow travertine for The Lintel bookend pair and The Oculus display object. Both are pieces designed to anchor a warm-toned room — oak floors, linen, brass.

Why we chose it

There is a particular kind of warm interior — clay-coloured walls, oak, jute, brass fittings — where every other natural stone we tried looked slightly wrong. Yellow travertine looked like it had always been there. That is the test for any material in a considered home.

Silver Grey Travertine

The cool cousin. Quieter, more architectural.

What it is

Silver grey travertine — sometimes called Silver Travertine, Silver Tobacco or Travertino Argento in trade — is travertine deposited under different mineral conditions, producing a cool, even grey instead of the more familiar warm beige. The best silver greys come from western Turkey, with smaller deposits in Italy and Iran.

Visually, silver grey travertine reads more like a fine limestone than a typical travertine. The pores are finer, the banding subtler, the overall surface quieter. It is the most architectural of the travertines, frequently specified for contemporary commercial interiors and high-end residential work where a warm stone would feel too domestic.

Working properties

The same as other travertines. Mohs 3 to 4, porous, sealed. Slightly less prone to visible staining than beige travertine simply because the grey ground colour hides small marks better.

In our collection

We use silver grey travertine for The Newel, an architectural object that sits on a low surface and asks to be looked at the way a sculpture does.

Why we chose it

Most stone homewares lean warm, because warm stone is forgiving. Silver grey is the stone you reach for when the room is already warm — when you need a piece that holds its own as a focal point without competing with timber, linen and clay. It is also the stone that ages most quietly. We have pieces in the studio that look identical after a year of daily handling.

Calacatta Viola

The drama piece. Used sparingly.

What it is

Calacatta Viola is a metamorphic marble from quarries near Afyonkarahisar in central Turkey. It is part of the broader Calacatta family of high-grade marbles, distinguished by a pale white-to-ivory background and pronounced veining in deep purple, plum and burgundy tones. The colour comes from iron-rich mineral inclusions formed during the metamorphic process.

Calacatta Viola is one of the most distinctive marbles produced anywhere in the world. The veining patterns are entirely unique to each block, with no two pieces ever matching exactly. The most prized blocks show bold, painterly veining; lower grades show muddier patterns and less contrast.

Working properties

Mohs hardness 3 to 4. Polishes brilliantly. Holds carving well, but the visual drama of the stone means the form needs to step back. We use simple shapes that let the stone do the talking. Like all calcium-carbonate marbles, it will etch with acids and benefits from sealing.

In our collection

Calacatta Viola features in our future pieces, where the stone's natural drama suits objects designed to sit as accents rather than everyday vessels.

Why we chose it

When a piece needs to be the centrepiece of a room, Calacatta Viola does work that no other stone can. We use it sparingly, because dramatic veining loses its effect when it is everywhere. A single Calacatta Viola object in a room of quiet beiges is unforgettable; a room full of Calacatta Viola is exhausting.

How we source

Every Lomāe piece begins as a block of raw stone, selected before it is cut. The blocks come from established quarries in Spain, Italy, Turkey and Iran, then travel to our manufacturing partner overseas, where they are carved, finished and inspected before shipping.

We work with one primary manufacturing partner because the relationship matters. Stone work is not industrial. The same block, given to two different workshops, will produce two different pieces — different cuts, different finishes, different judgement about which flaws are character and which are defects. We have spent the time it takes to build a working language with our partner. They know our pieces. They know the finishes we expect. They flag a block that falls short instead of pushing it through.

Where the trade name of a stone is geographically protected — Crema Marfil, Calacatta Viola — we verify origin at the block level. Where a stone is described by family (travertine, alabaster), we name the most likely origin region but acknowledge that exact block origin can vary between batches. We have written this honestly rather than pretending otherwise.

We inspect every piece before it leaves the workshop, and again when it arrives in New Zealand. Pieces with hairline cracks, unacceptable surface defects, or veining that pulls the piece away from its intended character are rejected. The rejection rate is real — somewhere between five and fifteen percent of any production run, depending on the material — and it is the single biggest reason our piece prices are what they are.

Choosing the right stone for your space

A short guide. If you are specifying for a project or buying for a particular room, this is roughly how we think about it.

For a warm interior — oak floors, linen, clay walls, brass fittings — yellow travertine, beige travertine and Crema Marfil all sit beautifully. Yellow travertine has the most depth; Crema Marfil is the quietest; beige travertine is the most textural.

For a cool or contemporary interior — concrete, pale timber, white walls, black hardware — silver grey travertine and Spanish alabaster work where warmer stones would feel out of place. Silver grey is architectural and structural; alabaster is jewel-like and lit.

For a room that needs a focal point — Calacatta Viola, used as a single accent piece. One object, not a collection.

For pieces in or near water — none of the stones we work with are right for bathroom or kitchen splash zones unsealed, and alabaster should not go near water at all. Crema Marfil and travertine, properly sealed and resealed annually, can live happily in a powder room or on a vanity. Calacatta Viola, the same. But sustained wet use is not what these pieces are for.

For a piece on a sunlit surface — silver grey travertine, beige travertine and Crema Marfil are the most stable under UV. Yellow travertine fades very slowly over years. Spanish alabaster is dimensionally stable but should not sit in direct sun, both for thermal reasons and because the warmth of the sun draws moisture from the air which the stone can absorb.

Care, in brief

Natural stone is meant to age. Honed surfaces will pick up the marks of use over time. We consider this part of the material's life, not damage to be prevented.

That said, every stone has its limits.

• Spanish alabaster must stay dry. Wipe with a dry or barely damp soft cloth. Do not use water, vinegar, citrus or commercial cleaners. Keep away from kitchens and bathrooms.
• Crema Marfil and Calacatta Viola are marbles. They will etch if exposed to acidic substances (wine, citrus, vinegar, coffee). The etching is not damage; it is a softened mark that becomes part of the patina. Use coasters and wipe spills if you want to prevent it.
• Travertine is porous and sealed before it leaves us, but the seal is not permanent. Refresh annually with a quality stone sealer if the piece is used regularly. Wipe spills as they happen.

For all our pieces, avoid abrasive cleaners, hot pans direct on the surface, and prolonged sun exposure (which can fade some stones, particularly yellow travertine).

A full care guide for each material is available on the Care Guide page.

Frequently asked questions

Is alabaster a type of marble?

No. Alabaster is a gypsum mineral; marble is metamorphic limestone. They look similar because both can be polished and carved to a fine surface, but they are geologically unrelated. Alabaster is much softer (Mohs 2 versus 3–4 for marble) and dissolves in water over time, where marble is water-stable. The two are often confused because Italian sculptors used both throughout history, sometimes in the same workshop.

What is travertine, and is it the same as marble?

Travertine is a sedimentary stone formed when mineral-rich water deposits calcium carbonate at hot springs. It is technically a form of limestone that has not yet metamorphosed into marble. Marble is what travertine becomes after millions more years of heat and pressure. Travertine is more porous and shows visible pores from gas bubbles trapped during formation; marble is denser and shows veining from impurities recrystallised under pressure.

Is travertine waterproof?

No. Travertine is naturally porous and will absorb liquids if unsealed. Our pieces are sealed at the factory, which substantially reduces absorption, but the seal is a treatment that wears off over time. A piece in regular use should be resealed every twelve to eighteen months with a quality penetrating stone sealer.

Why does my marble piece have a dull mark where I spilled wine?

That is an etch, not a stain. A stain is a colour change from a substance absorbing into the stone. An etch is a chemical reaction where an acid (wine, citrus, vinegar, coffee, some cleaning products) dissolves a microscopic amount of the calcium carbonate at the surface, leaving a duller patch. Etches can be re-polished by a specialist, but most owners eventually come to read them as part of the stone's character.

Will my stone piece scratch?

It depends on the stone and what you scratch it with. Spanish alabaster (Mohs 2) will mark from a fingernail. Marbles and travertines (Mohs 3–4) will scratch from anything harder — a knife blade, a piece of granite, a quartz watch back. They will not scratch from regular fabric, paper, or skin contact. For everyday placement and use, scratching is not a common issue.

How is hand-carved stone different from machine-cut stone?

Most mass-market stone homewares are CNC-routed: a computer-controlled cutter follows a digital file, producing identical pieces from each block. Hand-carved stone is shaped by a carver using a combination of power tools and hand tools, with the carver making judgement calls about the block, the grain, and the finish. Hand-carving produces pieces with small variations between them and a surface character that reads differently. Both approaches are valid; we work with hand-carved pieces because the variation is part of what we are selling.

Are these pieces food-safe?

Sealed marble and travertine are considered food-safe for dry contact and brief food contact, but we do not recommend our pieces for direct food service. The pieces are designed as decorative and display objects, not as tableware. Alabaster should not contact food at all.

Can I put a candle directly in The Vesper?

Yes. The Vesper is designed for a single tealight or small pillar candle. The wall thickness is calibrated to produce the translucent glow without overheating. Do not use multiple candles, do not use candles larger than 5cm in diameter, and do not leave the candle burning unattended for more than four hours.

Where exactly does my piece come from?

Our blocks are sourced from established quarries in Spain (alabaster, Crema Marfil), Italy and Turkey (travertine), Iran (yellow travertine), and Turkey (Calacatta Viola). The blocks are then transported to our manufacturing partner overseas, where they are hand-carved and finished. Each piece is inspected before leaving the workshop and again on arrival in New Zealand. We can provide block origin information for specific pieces on request to specifiers.

Why is the same stone different colours in different pieces?

Natural stone varies block to block, sometimes substantially. Two beige travertine blocks from quarries 20km apart can read as different colours. Within a single block, the colour can vary from top to bottom. We do our best to keep collections visually consistent, but a piece you order this year will not exactly match a piece from a different drop. We consider this part of buying natural stone rather than a defect, and we say so plainly.

Can you do custom pieces or sizes?

For trade clients — architects, interior designers and specifiers — we can sometimes accommodate custom dimensions or finish variations on existing forms, subject to block availability and minimum order quantities. Contact us at hello@lomaehome.com for trade enquiries.

How long will a Lomāe piece last?

Properly cared for, indefinitely. The materials we use have all been quarried and worked for at least a hundred years and in some cases two thousand. The pieces in your home will outlast everything else you own.

Questions about our materials

If you are specifying Lomāe pieces for a project or have specific material questions, we are happy to provide block origin information, dimensional drawings, and material samples to qualified architects and interior designers. Email hello@lomaehome.com.

For consumer enquiries, the FAQ covers the most common questions about our materials, finishes and care.