An Antiques Roadshow guest was gobsmacked when what her husband had dismissed as 'a piece of tat' turned out to be worth a small fortune.
A couple showed up on the programme to get the value of a couple of jewellery items. The wife's affection for one particular item, described by her other half as 'tat', didn't waver, despite his opinion.
She told expert Susan about the origin of the pieces: "They were from my husband's side - from his mother - and when she died, my husband said his mum had a lovely opal bracelet that I might like. So we dug it out and that was that.
"Amongst a heap of things in this big box, we reached the bottom and there it was. My husband scoffed, 'you don't want that - it's a load of tat'. It's just a piece of glass. But I insisted, 'well I like it.'"
Her partner chimed in with: "We'd like to know what it is! It's very big for a precious stone, I would have thought."
Susan then revealed the unexpected truth about the bangle. She said: "Let's start with the bangle first. We know it's opal like you said, but it's really beautiful. As we can see, there are these wonderful opals, all graduating in size, and have diamonds in between, which really help to bring out the beautiful colours.
"The greens, the blues, flashes of oranges we see around the stones. It really is totally magnificent and the added bonus with any piece of jewellery is having the original box which we have here. If we open the box up, we can see the piece was bought at Wartski's in Llandudno. It's now based in London but this is where they were established."
She added: "They've gone on to be one of the most important jewellers in the , known for selling Faberge but we can calm things a bit because this isn't Faberge, but it really is a super example of 1880s jewellery."
Focus then turned to the necklace, adding: "Then we come on to the piece of tat that you would call it. This comes from the Edwardian period and has diamonds which are set at the top here. They are set in platinum to the front. You need strength to support this jewel here. It's actually aquamarine. The colour's even all the way through the stone as well."
The big reveal came when Susan disclosed the potential auction value. She announced: "All in all, it's moved a long way from tat! The aquamarine pendant, if it went up to auction, would be around three to £5000.
"The opal bangle, of course, is a magnificent piece and if that came up to auction, we would be looking at an estimate of eight to £10,000," leading the owner to exclaim: "I wasn't expecting that! I think we better have another look in that jewellery box."
Antiques Roadshow airs on BBC One and BBC iPlayer
