A small rounded box, approximately 6.5cm in length, this is a perfect container for small trinkets, offerings, or anything that would fit your needs and practice.
This item ships directly from our store in Newmarket, Ontario. Due to irregularities in stone formation, the box you receive may not show the same color pattern as the one in the photo.
Soapstone is called "soapstone" because it's a very soft rock, definitionally a 1 on the Mohs scale of hardness, and some of the softer grades of soapstone can even feel like soap to the touch. This makes it very popular for carving. Soapstone has been very popular the world over for both decorative and practical items. It has been popular among the Inuit for carving and among other First Nations peoples for cooking implements. Viking Age Scandinavians also used soapstone cooking pots. Due to its ability to absorb, store, and then radiate heat, soapstone is popular for lining fireplaces, woodstoves, cookstoves, and other heaters. It's even used as high voltage insulation.
Soapstone was also a popular gravestone material in the southeastern U.S. for a time. It's also popular for making smoking pipes due to low heat conductivity. It is used as a marking material by carpenters, craftsmen, and even seamstresses because because its marks are visible but not permanent, while it's also very popular among welders because the mark doesn't disappear in the application of heat. Soapstone is also used for casting soft metals such as silver and pewter. On the other end of the spectrum in potential uses, so called "whiskey stones" are created from soapstone, as it can be placed in the freezer and then in a beverage to chill the beverage without diluting it as ice would.
Soapstone is a talc-schist and is created by intense heat and pressure placed on stone when tectonic plates subduct (are forced down into the Earth's molten mantle by collision with another plate). It is also called steatite.
Possible correspondences: cooking, crafts, decor, durability, hearth, metalwork, withstanding "heat" and "pressure," softness, universal usefulness.
