OUR STONES
Opal was named Australia's national gemstone in 1993, and for good reason — our opal fields are larger than the rest of the world's combined. Every opal is one of a kind: a flash of colour formed as silica seeped into the earth left behind by an inland sea, a hundred million years ago. No two are ever alike, which means no two pieces we make with them ever will be.
Our opals come from Lightning Ridge in northern New South Wales — the world's premier source of black opal, the rarest and most prized of all. Its dark body makes the play of colour inside seem to glow: electric blues, greens and reds against near-black. These are stones with a genuine sense of place, dug from Australian ground and carried straight to our bench.
Opal is won on a small scale — by miners and fossickers working modest claims, not the vast open pits of industrial mining. It's a low-impact way to bring a gem into the world, and a traceable one: stones that pass through few hands, from a place we can name. When you know your opal came from Lightning Ridge, you know something real about how it was found.
From rough to finished stone, our opals are shaped locally — cut into hearts, stars and faceted forms, then set by hand in our Sydney studio into solid gold and silver. Keeping the whole journey in Australia means the gem, the cutting and the making all share one home.
Opal is softer than a diamond or sapphire and holds a trace of water within it, so it likes to be treated gently. Avoid knocks, harsh chemicals, and sudden extremes of heat or dryness; clean it with a soft cloth and mild, soapy water rather than a harsh cleaner. Treated kindly, an opal will keep its fire for a lifetime.
ONE OF A KIND
An opal is a small piece of the Australian earth, hundreds of millions of years in the making, and utterly unrepeatable. To wear one is to carry a landscape, and a story, that belongs to no one else.