Opal ~ The Birthstone of October

These stones are some of the most exciting gemstones available to jewellery lovers, with their magical display of all the colours of the rainbow and so intense that the ancient Bedouins believed they contained lightning and had fallen from the sky during thunderstorms. If you have ever looked into a particularly beautiful opal, you too might become as enthralled by them as we are at LLJ.

Opals are found in many places around the world, including Ethiopia, Mexico and Brazil, but probably the most special and most valuable are from Australia, which is where we source the opals for our one of a kind pieces. We love setting them into 18ct gold, occasionally alongside other gemstones.

We work with a small family firm who regularly travel to the opal fields to buy rough material from miners they have worked with for a lifetime. They then cut and polish the stones back in their home on the NSW coast. Laura then has the hard task of selecting stones, which is when she really must bring all her powers of self-control into play ;)

Opal is Octobers birthstone - though we are in love with it all year long. We are looking forward to showing you some new one of a kind pieces that we are making right now in our Bloomsbury workshop.