Monday, September 8, 2014

Pink & Red Diamonds & World Record Breakers!

 In the world of diamonds red and pink are the rarest of the colors that occur naturally. A much buzzed about fancy intense pink pear shaped diamond weighing 8.41ct is ready to be auctioned by Sothebys on October 7th in Hong Kong. This diamond auction will be part of the "Magnificent Jewels and Jadeite" auction.

The 8.41cts pink pear shaped diamond is one of the largest to be seen at auction. An oval pink diamond weighing 5.50cts was sold at Christies for $9.5 Million dollars. The absolute largest pink diamond to be auctioned was in 2010 when the fancy intense pink diamond aka "Graff Pink" diamond weighing 24.76cts was sold to Laurence Graff (of Graff Diamonds) for $46.1 Million dollars or roughly $2 Million per carat.

 With great stones come good stories. In November of 2013 the largest pink diamond weighing 59.60cts was set to be the record holder in the terms of stone color and sale. The stone was auctioned by Sothebys in Hong Kong. The diamond was originally mined in South Africa in 1999 as a 132.5-carat rough by De Beers. It was cut by the Steinmetz Diamond Company over a two-year period and was formerly known as the “Steinmetz Pink.” In 2003, it was shown publicly in Monaco and was displayed at the Smithsonian Institute as part of its “Splendor of Diamonds” exhibit. The Pink Star was sold privately in 2007,There was quite an interest in this stone for the simple fact of the large size and the intensity of the color. Stone cutter Isaac Wolf beat out two other bidders in a quick bid for the pricey pink diamond.  Isaac won the bid after 5 minutes, with the winning price being $83.2 Million dollars. A record for any stone sold at Auction, ever! But here's the interesting part, he defaulted on the sale! He did everything by the book, but pay for the stone. He had stated that he was purchasing this stone for a group of investors that were putting up the money for the sale.

  Since Sothebys had guaranteed the price of the diamond at $60 Million, Sothebys had to buy back the diamond from the seller! Ouch~ After the stone was valued at $72 Million they are still in talks with Issac regarding the stones future. My only question is is there some sort of trouble or something that Isaac Wolf and the investors will face because of the default?  Its crazy to think about~



I can only imagine the shade of pink in person
  

So when recently mined red/ orange diamonds were located at the Lesotho mines, jewelry buys and lovers the world over have been anxiously awaiting the day when they will make it to the market. 
Rio Tinto is an Austrailain mine that is holding an auction titled the 2014 Argyle Pink Diamonds Tender collection which is going under the hammer which consists of 55 diamonds, including 51 pink and purplish red diamonds and four Fancy Red diamonds.

Only 13 Fancy Red diamonds have been included in the tender in the last 30 years.Who knew that Australia is the leader when it comes to producing red pink diamonds? Rio Tinto controls the market for pink diamonds from the Argyle mine in Australia. Around 65pc of the world's diamond supplies come from the Cullinan mine in South Africa.  Jean-Marc Lieberherr, Rio Tinto Diamonds managing director said: "Decades ago, no one would have believed that Australia held the secret of diamonds, let alone the world's entire source of rare pink and red diamonds.

"The pinnacle of the production from Rio Tinto's Argyle mine, the annual pink tender diamonds are now celebrated internationally as amongst the rarest and most valuable diamonds in the world. We have seen and continue to see sustained demand and price growth for Argyle pink diamonds." Red diamonds were actually discovered in 1979 by a group of gemologists in a an ant hill no less~  What a lovely sight that must of been..


a portion of the red diamonds mined by Rio Tinto, Australia  largest diamond mine
 With red diamonds being one of the rares in colors, its going to get gem lovers alike waiting for the sale.  Its a shame that in the US we dont hear to much about the colored diamond market that stretches past Europe. I'll be anxious to see the results~

   Large mined diamonds are in the news more so now with the recent find in the Lesotho and South African mines. But to see large record holding gems is another story. Called the "Ophir Collection" they have an astounding 9 record holding stones in their collection. Here are the nine world records in the collection~

the largest Faceted Sapphire

the largest Cut Brown Sapphire
the largest Cut Musgravite

the largest Cut Tanzanite
the largest cut Hibonite, the largest cut Neptunite, the largest Cut Painite, the largest Cut Serendibite, and finally the largest Cut Grandidierite. Pictures were not available for thoses tones

The largest, the blue sapphire weighing 31,308cts is the largest cut sapphire.  The real difference between the larger sized diamonds is that the quality of the diamonds is always uniform while the color and saturation of these stones is of different quality. I can only imagine how large the rough sapphire was prior to cutting, what a task that mist of been for the cutter!

                                                            Keep Sparkling until next time~

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