This is a simply STUNNING Universe marble. Usually I am pretty happy with the way the pics turn out when I'm photographing Universes, but I can tell you that for this one, the photos don't really do the marble justice at all, and it looks WAY better in hand. That's because there are so many layers of depth in this one which you just can't catch in these photos, with a big chunk of dark green moldavite resting on the top of the fuming, and then drilling down into levels of opals and fuming and planets that is just incredible. Both major planets that you see are SO nicely done, so gorgeous as they rest in space there. That HUGE chunk of opal is staggeringly wonderful, with so many colors flashing at you from every direction as you move the Universe around in hand. But in addition to all of this is Gateson's latest new inclusion - a strange type of glass that has been named 'solid state frit'. If you look, you can see all of these pink-ruby colored jewels floating around the opal in a special sort of star field. That is the solid state glass, and solid state is a good name for it, because somehow it doesn't melt into the rest of the borosilicate glass like normal frit would at those temperatures. Rather, it remains in that solid state creating a beautiful form for applications like this (and can even be used in soft glass as well - it's trippy stuff)! This is one of the first ever marbles to have this glass incorporated (I got this from Gateson at the November Marble Masters 3 show, before some of the other applications of this glass started tricking in out there), and of course one of the first Universes to have it. With all of these things going on inside, including some amazing fuming, this Universe is just flat out a BLAST to explore! I guarantee you will LOVE IT!! Signed 'Gateson 2014'.