Helan stone, produced in Helan Mountain, is delicate, firm but not brittle. Its color is naturally dark purple and bean green. Some structures such as jade belt, moire, eyebrow, silver line and stone eye are skillfully sandwiched, and patterns such as clouds, moon, water and mountains are elegant and natural. After carving by skilled craftsmen, it has become a good inkstone handicraft. At the end of the Qing dynasty, there was a saying that there were two rivers and three Helan mountains at one end. He Lan Yan is simple and elegant, beautiful in appearance and unique in style. It has the miraculous effect of not absorbing water, easily developing ink and not damaging ink, and staying in the inkstone for several days after stamping. It is deeply loved by calligraphers of all ages and is recognized as the best in inkstone.
There is a large vertical screen carved with Helan stone by Ningxia stone carvers in Ningxia Hall of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. When Comrade Dong/KLOC-0 visited Ningxia in February, 963, he wrote a poem praising: "The color is as deep as purple and the grain is as thin as Venus. If it is made into Four Treasures of the Study, it should be polished without phosphorus." In recent years, with the deepening of international exchanges, He Lanyan has gone global and been widely welcomed by Japanese and Southeast Asian people.