Crystal Opal White refers to crystal opal that has a whitish appeal to it. You can usually see through the opal if the potch is not too dense, but if you hold the white crystal opal up to the light you will be able to se through the stone but when you hold it in the palm of your hand it will look very dense and not very translucent at all.
This opal is a medium grade opal that can be quite common around the areas of Coober Pedy and Mintabie in Australia. Some white opal can have beautiful pattern and color and is mostly found in the form of seam or seam nobby opal.
Since Lightning Ridge is known for fantastic nobby opal the milky or white crystal opal can be quite rare in Lightning Ridge.
Opal cutters are happy to cut white opal because of its ease of cutting the material. When it comes in the form of seam opal, the rough can easily be faced and polished because it is already flat. Very rarely will you find this type of opal with high domes.
Crystal opal white can reach prices of up to $1000 per carat and can hold colors of most of the spectrum. The most common are orange, red and green. Even though it is not considered as valuable, blue is very rare to be found in opal crystal white.
Most people in the world when they think of opal, they imagine a crystal opal white because in the early days of opal sales worldwide, most of the opal came from Coober Pedy and Lightning Ridge was not on the map yet. So most antique opal jewellery you find around the world has been set with a white opal. Especially in the United Kingom.
For more information on opal cutting or purchasing opal. Please email blackopalsdirect@live.com or you can call me on Skype My username is Blackopaldirect and it’s free!
No comments yet.