Scorpion-Motif Brooch with Turquoise and Lapis

Turquoise carried by silver, with lapis as a foil, gives this pin its color and its lineage. Stone inlay was a Los Castillo specialty, and turquoise, with its strong blue-green, is a natural fit for the workshop's marriage of metal and stone.

The taller was recognized for setting stone into metal, an interest Morrill ties to the experimental work around Los Castillo (Morrill, p. 206). Combining turquoise with lapis extends that into a two-stone palette.

The workshop, founded in Taxco in 1939, was among the talleres grandes whose scale supported this material experiment (Stromberg, p. 41). Turquoise pins appear periodically and are collected for the stone.