Alabaster, Marble or Onyx: Which Stone Light Suits Your Room

Stone lighting is usually sold on looks, which is a problem, because the three stones used most often look very similar in a product photograph and do entirely different things once there is a bulb behind them.

Here is how alabaster, marble and onyx actually differ.

The quick version

Alabaster is soft, highly translucent and warm. It glows evenly and hides its bulb. It is the default for lighting for good reason.

Marble is hard, mostly opaque and cool. It works as a structural element in a fitting, as a base or a body, but it does not light up. Anything sold as a marble light is usually either very thin marble, alabaster being called marble loosely, or a marble base with a different diffuser.

Onyx is hard, dramatically translucent and strongly banded. It makes the boldest lit surface of the three, and the most expensive.

Alabaster

Alabaster is gypsum, roughly 2 on the Mohs hardness scale, formed by ancient seawater evaporating and leaving mineral beds behind.

What it gives you is the most even glow of the three. The crystal structure scatters light thoroughly, so a lit alabaster shade has no hot spot over the bulb and no dark corners. Colour is pale: white through cream and honey, with soft grey or amber veining that reads as cloud rather than stripe.

It is the quietest of the three. If you want the light to be the feature and the stone to be a beautiful way of delivering it, this is the one.

The trade-off is softness. It scratches, it does not like water, and it is strictly an indoor material. More on that in what is alabaster.

Marble

Marble is metamorphic calcite, around 3 on the same scale, formed when limestone was cooked and compressed underground.

It is harder, tougher and almost entirely opaque. Light bounces off marble rather than through it. Cut thin enough, a few pale marbles will pass a little light, but the result is patchy: the veins block light unevenly and you get a visible bright patch wherever the bulb is closest.

Where marble earns its place in lighting is as structure. A marble base on a table lamp, a marble backplate, a marble body under a fabric or glass shade. It is heavy, cold to the touch, feels expensive and takes a polish that alabaster cannot.

If you have seen a fitting described as a marble wall light and it glowed evenly in the photograph, it is worth asking which stone it actually is. A good number of them are alabaster.

Onyx

Onyx in the stone trade means banded calcite, not the black gemstone of the same name. It forms in caves and around mineral springs, laid down in dramatic parallel layers.

Lit from behind, onyx is spectacular. The banding turns into stripes of amber, green, honey and white, and the effect is far stronger than alabaster. It is the stone behind most of those backlit hotel reception walls.

Two things to weigh. It is considerably more expensive, because the large consistent slabs it needs are rare. And it is loud: an onyx fitting dominates a room rather than warming it, which is wonderful in a bar and a lot in a bedroom.

Which to choose for which room

Bedrooms. Alabaster, comfortably. You want the light soft at eye level and the pattern quiet enough to sleep beside.

Hallways and stairs. Alabaster. Repeated fittings need to be calm, because you will see several at once.

Dining rooms. Alabaster for a linear pendant over the table, where you want the light on the food and not in anyone's eyes. Onyx if the room is a set piece and the light is meant to be talked about.

Living rooms. Alabaster for wall lights, marble for a table lamp base where the stone is felt more than lit.

Bars, reception areas, feature walls. Onyx.

Cost

Alabaster is the most accessible. Small wall lights start around £169.00 including VAT because Spanish alabaster is quarried at scale and works easily.

Marble sits in the middle as a raw material but the fittings are often dearer, because marble is heavy and the fixings, packaging and shipping all cost more.

Onyx is the expensive one. Large, evenly banded, crack-free blocks are genuinely scarce and the waste rate when cutting them is high.

In all three the carving usually costs more than the stone.

Durability and care

Marble is the one you can be slightly careless with. It handles damp, takes a wipe with a damp cloth and survives a knock.

Onyx is harder than alabaster but more brittle, and it chips along its bands.

Alabaster needs the most care and gets it easily: a dry cloth, kept away from damp, and nothing acidic anywhere near it. See how to clean alabaster lamps.

None of the three belongs in a steamy bathroom or outdoors.

What we stock

We have concentrated on alabaster, because for lighting specifically it does the job better than the alternatives at a price that makes sense in a normal house.

The alabaster lighting collection covers wall lights, flush ceiling lights, linear pendants and chandeliers, in brass, copper and black. If you are set on onyx or a marble base for a particular project, call 0330 133 6617 and we will tell you honestly whether we can help.