Jewelry connoisseurs have gone crazy for colored diamonds. And their appetites were practically insatiable in 2013.
In October 2013, an 8.77 carat cut-cornered rectangular modified brilliant-cut, GIA-graded Fancy Intense pink diamond sold for $6.3 million at Christie’s New York, coming in at $721,200 per carat. The same auction saw a 3.80 carat round-cornered rectangular modified brilliant-cut GIA-graded Fancy Vivid blue diamond (above) sell for nearly $4 million –a little more than $1 million per carat.
As it turns out, the October auction was a warm-up for the main events in November. A 14.82 carat pear modified brilliant-cut Fancy Vivid orange diamond (The Orange) sold for $35.5 million at Christie’s Geneva. This beauty was also graded by GIA, and at $2.4 million per carat, it earned the highest-ever per-carat price for a gemstone at auction.
Also in November, Sotheby’s Geneva saw the sale of the 59.60 carat the Pink Star – a GIA-graded oval mixed cut Fancy Vivid pink that sold for $83.2 million. Renamed the Pink Dream by its current owner, it was expected to fetch $60 million, until a bidding war started. As Russell Shor, senior industry analyst at GIA noted, the price of the Pink Dream was comparable to prices paid for artwork by some of the master painters.
So what’s driving the colored diamond craze?
Hollywood A-listers like Jennifer Lopez, Penelope Cruz, and Oprah Winfrey are wearing them, and it’s no secret that celebrities are often trendsetters. The exceptional rarity of these stones is also behind the frenzy: Fancy-colored diamonds are far rarer than diamonds in the normal color range. Some experts estimate that only 2% of total rough diamond production is fancy colored. The percentage is even lower for fashioned diamonds: Only one out of 10,000 carats of fashioned diamonds displays fancy color, and a diamond’s chances of displaying intense color are even lower – one in 25,000. Heightening the craze is the expectation that the Argyle mine, the main source of natural pink diamonds, will be exhausted by 2020. Add all these together, and you have the ingredients for a serious trend.
Not surprisingly, jewelry shoppers have also caught colored diamond fever. Some retailers and online vendors are selling synthetic colored diamonds or treated-color natural diamonds to satisfy the demand. These beauties available in a rainbow of color choices are becoming more affordable than ever before.
If you’re in the market for a colored diamond, consider looking for a GIA Colored Diamond Report. GIA created the GIA Colored Diamond Grading System in 1994, and has graded important colored diamonds, including the Hope, the Pink Dream, and many others. A GIA report is virtually a requirement by all the big auction houses and other key players. Why not make it a requirement for your next purchase too?
Which do you prefer: colorless or colored diamonds? Do you think colored diamonds are a fad or are they here to stay?
Main image is a GIA-graded Fancy Vivid blue diamond. Image courtesy of Christie’s Images LTD. 2013.
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