“I have no history beyond my grandparents. Most of Berger’s extended family was lost in World War II. And this was just the first room - to my astonishment, there were four more to go. I was hard-pressed to remember the last time I’d felt this way about anything, let alone dozens of things, all in one room. Every which way I looked, it seemed, I found myself staring at something truly unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Berger’s gallery is a massive space, filled with lush trees and plants and rays of brilliant white museum lights centered upon glittering crystal behemoths that are almost too much to take in. And then, slowly, an astonishing new world came into view. As I walked inside, I couldn’t see anything at first, my eyes adjusting from the overcast Seattle light. Indeed I had no idea what I was about to witness as Berger opened the doors to his warehouse. ![]() “Well,” he said, “These aren’t like crystals you’ve seen before.” I’d cautioned Berger beforehand that I might not be the best person for the job crystals, decidedly, have never really been my thing. ![]() All of the amazing pieces in the collection are now available for sale and you can schedule your own private showing. Top crystal and fossil collectors and major natural history museums throughout the world – including the Smithsonian where three giant crystals from Richard’s collection surround the Hope Diamond – but also to new crystal and fossil lovers and collectors. For the first time in twenty years, Berger is opening up his world-class gallery not just to He’s been profiled on everything from NBC Evening Program in Seattle, which proclaimed that “Richard Berger has what is considered the most spectacular private collection of giant natural crystals and fossils in the world.” to NPR, and CBS Sunday Morning, which described Masterpieces of the Earth as “Mother Nature’s private museum.” His crystals also line the gallery walls of some of the most prominent museums in the world.Īnd yet it’s a rarefied few who have had the opportunity to see his legendary collection up-close in person multi-millionaires and acclaimed artists and some of the most influential people in the world, from Andy Warhol to Stephen Hawking. For over 40 years he’s worked to amass a carefully-curated collection that includes some of the most exquisite, largest and rarest crystals and fossils that have ever been unearthed. Indeed among crystal lovers and collectors, Berger is a legend, albeit an elusive one. He’s an interesting guy, to say the least, and yet perhaps the most interesting thing about Richard Berger is what’s sitting behind the nondescript warehouse door he’s walking me towards right now one of, if not the most, spectacular collection of giant crystals anywhere in the world. But he’s also a Bronx- born, straight-talking New Yorker, with little appetite for bullshit or hard R’s but an abiding one for gentle cynicism, which the fresh Seattle air has as yet been unable to stamp out. He’s an old-school hippie, for one, who wears his beard long and his Birkenstocks daily and can still recall in intimate detail that summer in 1968 he spent couch-surfing in Haight-Ashbury. ![]() The founder of Masterpieces of the Earth, Berger is a study in contradictions. Then I remembered that I had seen Masterpieces of the Earth featured on CBS Sunday Morning program and began to settle down. As I stood on the side of the highway, the smell of day-old cheese whiz growing stronger by the second, I wasn’t entirely sure which one it was. That Masterpieces of the Earth didn’t even have a sign was as sure an indication as any that I was in for something I’d never experienced before. In my experience, places like the one where I was headed- places that contain some of the most beautiful things it’s possible to see in this world- usually have relatively grandiose entrances. For about the tenth time that morning I checked my phone again. “You’re sure this is the right address?” my Uber driver asked. A dusty philly cheesesteak shop helmed by a yawning teenager presented the only perceptible sign of life within view. My Uber had just stopped on the side of a busy highway in suburban Seattle, a dull stretch of road dotted with beige stucco office buildings and the occasional used car dealership. on a Wednesday morning, and I was sure I was in the wrong place.
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