Colors of Trentino Porphyry

Of particular interest are the colors of porphyry. Porphyry is quarried in mid-mountain open-pit quarries organized in a stepped system. The material is layered in varying thicknesses with great structural mutability leading to an enormous variety of stone colors. As a result, the presence of dissimilar bedding at the various elevations influenced by seepage and cracking of complex magnitude, together with contamination that nonetheless arose from the natural environment, with concretions and oxides penetrated in diversified form and quantity, made it so that any uniformity of color of the porphyry was impossible. Obviously, this is detectable not only on a general level considering the mining area in its entirety, but even within individual mining areas where diversity and inhomogeneity can characterize one step from another.

Peculiarities

The colors of porphyry range from gray, to gray-violet, from red to purple to bright rust. The peculiarity is, however, that the pigments that distinguish one type of coloration are often present simultaneously in differentiated percentages in all or part of the others as well.

That is, Trentino porphyry is characterized by variegated coloration where, even in the case of possible color selection, the same is only possible in a tendential form and never definitive and absolute. Of course, the consideration is valid both for small-scale elements and, even more so, for other production types. We are talking about tiles, slabs, treads, thresholds, curbstones, etc., made of variegated layered material, not of block and therefore subject to continuous color mutations.

That said, it should be added that from the technical point of view, and therefore related to the structural and physical-mechanical characteristics of the product, there is no contraindication related to the specific colors of porphyry. On the contrary, the shade of bright rust coloration is known to be an aesthetically valuable element for the realization of significant design solutions.