An opal pendant by Leisha Wheeler in our upcoming Jewellery auction features Australia’s national gemstone – the opal. This gemstone has an important role in the country’s cultural history.
Opals in Australia
Since the late nineteenth century, Australia has been the primary location for opal deposits and mining. 90 to 95 per cent of the world’s supply of opals today come from deposits across the country. The majority of Australian opal mines are in New South Wales, South Australia, and Queensland. Some sources estimate that Australia’s opal fields are larger than the rest of the world’s opal fields combined. The country’s close connection to the stone has, unsurprisingly, intensified over the twentieth century. In 1993 the Governor-General, the Hon. Bill Hayden AC, declared opal to be Australia’s national gemstone. A year later, Australia’s women’s basketball team became fondly known as ‘The Opals’.
Opals in Aborginal culture
The rush to mine opals in the nineteenth century was unlikely the first Australian interaction with the stone. Earlier Aboriginal oral stories weave opals into the creation of the Earth. In the era of creation, known as the Dreamtime, many spirits worked to form the world as we know it. The Rainbow Serpent created the hills and valleys as it moved across the land and coiled in water holes to rest. After storms, the Rainbow Serpent moved from water pool to water pool, creating rainbows as it travelled across the sky. Its scales fell to the earth as opals.
Opal formation
Precious opals are prized for their display of play-of-colour, a visual phenomenon characterised by its flashes of greens, blues, reds and oranges. When white light interacts with opal’s structure of very small spheres of silica, the light splits to travel through the spaces between the spheres. This diffraction splits the white light into its spectral colours depending on the wavelength of the colours and the size of the spaces. The result is the mesmerising colour display we associate with precious opals. Boulder opals form when silica solidified as a seam of precious opal within the cracks of an ironstone boulder. This is where we derive the variety’s name.
Jewellery by Leisha Wheeler
Leisha Wheeler is known for her opal jewellery set with stones from the mine she operates with her husband, John, in Lightning Ridge, Australia. Located in northern New South Wales, this small outback town is an area of plentiful deposits and is famed for its black opals.
Originally from Erdington in Birmingham, John Wheeler moved to Australia in 1978 and was drawn to opals. He soon invested in a mine, which he later took over, and began the heavy work of digging it himself. Leisha selects the best of their finds for her jewellery designs.
Leisha Wheeler jewellery at auction
You can recognise Leisha Wheeler’s designs from her use of opals and the fact that they are signed ‘Leisha’.
Let’s look at one of Leisha Wheeler’s designs from one of our auctions – an opal ‘Footprint’ Pendant, by Leisha Wheeler.
The main focus of this necklace is a boulder opal. It is joined by five diamonds and set in an 18ct gold drop pendant,
Leisha’s inspiration for the pendant may have come from a similar Aboriginal Dreamtime story that tells of another Creator who travelled to our plane of the Earth on a rainbow; when they stepped from the rainbow, their feet touched the ground and imbued it with colourful stones: opals. The boulder opal and the arrangement of the five diamonds in this pendant resemble a stylised footprint – a nod, perhaps, to the Creator that gave us opals.
We will enter this pendant into auction on October 25th as lot 5 with an estimate of £100 – £150.
