9.54 Carat Blue Diamond from Shirley Temple Black

Some Diamonds beat the rate of inflation.  By a lot.

This is the story.  In 1940, Shirley Temple Black’s father bought this Blue diamond for her for about $7,200.00 US dollars.  In 2016 dollars, that’s about $121,600.   Miss Temple Black wore this beauty for several years. Now that that Miss Temple Black  has passed, her diamond is up for auction.

The estimated sale price from the auction house is $35 million U S Dollars. Wow.  Whoever owns this gem now must be happy.  She wore this beautiful diamond for years, and the heir will cash out big time with this sale.  This surely beats the stockmarket!

More tidbits of interest like this to come.

Gerald

 

Looking At Diamond Material

When I meet with new clients, I go through my Diamond 101 speech, which includes telling them what type of material comprises the diamond.  Not all diamonds are made of the exact same stuff, and I am the biggest diamond nerd who seems to know more than other diamond dealers when it comes to this area.

I compare diamonds to a cake.  So all white cakes are the same right?  Wrong!!  One white cake looks like every other, but all white cakes don’t taste the same. The ingredients and the method of cooking make the difference.

All white diamonds look the same until you examine them under a loop or microscope. In the detailed close-up, you can tell the difference.  For instance, diamonds from Zimbabwe have a little thickness in the crystal that doesn’t appear in diamonds from other countries.

When looking at diamonds, most people, including diamond dealers, have no clue what they are looking at nor what signals to look for. For instance, Type IIa diamonds are very rare crystals. Unlike other diamonds, there is little to no hydrogen in the crystal make up.  But going one step further, there is the ULTIMATE RARE diamond crystal, known as a Golconda.  These extra rare diamonds are like the Type IIa diamonds, but for some reason they have a look that NO OTHER diamond crystal has in the world. These diamonds came out of the Golconda region in India. The Hope diamond is a Golconda.  Golcondas are extremely rare and as clear as water.

Don’t get confused when a diamond dealer says a diamond is a Type IIa/Golconda diamond.  Golcondas are very few and far between, and nine times out of ten that dealer is incorrect. Not his fault. He just doesn’t know the difference.

So I hope to eliminate confusion about diamond material.  Not all diamonds are the same.  Far from it.  And you should learn the difference.

Cleaning Your Jewelry At Home

Before resuming with my Selling Your Jewelry Posts, I wanted to talk about something very important.

Over the years I’ve heard horror stories from clients on how they gave their jewelry to fine jewelry stores for cleaning, and when they got the cleaned jewels back they never really looked the same. The reason is likely because the stones were switched for lesser quality stones.  It happens ALL.  THE.  TIME.  So many stories.  Not every fine jewelry store does this, but I heard of even very fine, very “reputable” stores doing this.   This is my opinion and hearsay, but I have an easy, quick way to avoid this.  Clean your jewelry at home!

This is what I do at my own house and for my clients.

— Place your jewels to be cleaned on a towel in the kitchen or bathroom next to the sink.

— Plug the drain.

— Get a bowl and add ammonia and liquid soap, just a squirt or two.

— Mix the cleaning solution, then place the jewels in it.

— If your jewelry consists of solely metal and diamonds, let them sit for a few minutes.

— With a soft tooth brush start brushing the top sides and under belly of the jewels.

— Rinse with warm water and again lay on a towel.

— Use a blow dryer to dry the jewels.

The result are AMAZING.  Everything will look better than new.

For color stones, I don’t let them sit as long in the same solution.  For pearls, I use ivory soap and warm water. Let the pearls dry naturally — no blow dryer, as the heat can damage them. Take your time, as the drill holes need to dry as well as the string.

It’s that easy.

Moral of today’s story — NEVER TAKE YOUR JEWELS SOMEWHERE TO BE CLEANED.

Why Appraisals Are Important – Part 2: Insurance

In my previous post, I talked about not using appraisals to tell you how much you can expect to sell it for, but rather for proof that you owned your piece before you traveled. Today, I want to talk about another reason – Insurance against loss.

A typical appraisal includes an image of the item and every bit of descriptive information possible. It has to stand up as a legal document in court, and is proof to an insurance company that you owned this specific item. If the item is lost or stolen, the appraisal tells the insurance company how much it would cost to replace that very same item on the retail market, that is, the RETAIL PRICE, not how much it cost you to buy it.

An appraisal is also not used to value an item on the resale market. Why? It’s because the item is now “used”, not “new”, and is not for sale in a retail store. The biggest misconception about appraisals is that the owner of a piece of jewelry sees the number on the appraisal and thinks that the item is worth that much if they want to sell it later. Wrong! In the appraisal world, a lot of work and research goes into valuing the item for replacement, especially for estate and antique jewelry. But this valuation does not tell you the market price of that item if you’re looking to sell it. You are probably not a retail store selling that piece, so you are not going to command a retail price. You may not even command a wholesale price, unless you’re dealing with a reputable dealer, because any wholesaler needs to buy their inventory at less than a wholesale price to stay in business.

The moral of the story: Don’t spend your money on appraisals if you want to sell an item of jewelry. Take the jewelry to a reputable dealer who will work with private clients to eliminate the middleman and get you the best possible price. But please do get your jewels appraised and update the appraisals every couple of years for insurance and for travel. This will save you headaches and money.

Beware Who You’re Dealing With / Buyer BEWARE!

Here’s yet another reason you need to have a trustworthy private jeweler. This unfortunately is a very common scam.

I had made a diamond necklace for a client.  I saw her wearing it several years later, but the diamond looked very different. She had worn it so much that it had gotten dirty and she sent it out for cleaning to a “reputable” neighborhood jeweler. She did not come to me because she “didn’t want to bother me.” When I looped the necklace, it was clear that the “reputable” neighborhood jeweler had switched out her flawless diamond for a far inferior one. There were several inclusions in this diamond (the previous one had none). The prongs holding the diamond were bent inwards, indicating that this new stone was significantly smaller (it was more than 10% smaller), and it clearly was not the same diamond. The moral of the story is make sure you can trust whoever is cleaning your jewelry, or better yet, learn how to clean it yourself. Or if you’re giving your diamond to someone to clean, make sure you tell them exactly what your diamonds are, so you can guarantee you get those same diamonds back.

Why You Need A Private Jeweler — Part 2

It has been a while since my last post. But I’ve accumulated a lot of stories that I wanted to share. Today, I wanted to offer an additional reason WHY you need a private jeweler.

I have two recent clients who wanted to sell their unwanted jewelry. I looked at each of their collections and assessed the current market value in the second hand market.

In the first case, I had a client who had inherited a ring from her wealthy aunt that she thought was worth a lot of money. She said it was made by a famous designer.  When I evaluated the ring, I did not see a signature on it, so there was no proof that the designer she was told had made the ring had actually made it. So the resale value was half of what she thought. If she tried to sell it on her own, she would have made much less than half. But because I could guide her and tell her THE TRUTH about the ring, I told her the actual value of the ring and she didn’t get ripped off. Private jewelers know the different resale markets, understand true valuation, and will tell you the truth.  Each of these factors is complicated and there are unscrupulous dealers who might take advantage of the unaware.

In the second case, I had a client who had a very small, 0.25 carat diamond engagement ring for twenty-two years. Her husband had become a very successful and wealthy Beverly Hills investment banker. She decided to upgrade her diamond, and came to me for a new, bigger one. Looking at her lifestyle and social circle, I felt she needed (and could easily afford) a 5 carat diamond. She resisted and only wanted a 3-carat, which I told her was too small for her.  She’d come back within two years wanting a bigger one.

She didn’t take my advice and got the 3 carat diamond. Sure enough, a year-and-a-half later, that diamond was too small for her and she wanted a bigger one. When she had bought the 3 carat diamond, her husband insisted that I sign a document that guaranteed I would repurchase her diamond for the original price because he didn’t trust that I was giving him a good deal. I signed it, even though I told him it wasn’t going to be a good deal for him, but he didn’t trust my advice. A year-and-a-half later, that same diamond was worth significantly more, and because of the paper he made sign, I bought it back and was able to profit from the higher price, instead of him. And the wife now sports a 8 carat diamond in her engagement ring. As for the husband, I asked him if he wanted me to sign another guarantee if he didn’t trust I was giving him a good price. That was the quickest “No” I ever heard. BTW — that 8 carat diamond is now worth six times what he paid for it. And now he trusts me.

French Cut Diamonds

French cut Diamonds are among the most beautiful diamond cuts!!

The French Cut Diamond was created in the 1400s but really gained in favor in the 17th century. The French Cut Diamonds were loved and worn by royalty and nobility. The name French Cut, oddly enough, came from being not being cut in France but because at one time the French cut diamond was the most desired cut in France.

This cut is extremely rare today. Most people or jewelers don’t even know what a French Cut is or looks like.

The images don’t do the cut justice. When you see them in the light, OMG!  Have your sun glasses ready!!

The brilliance in a French Cut is like no other cut in a diamond. The sparkle is like a rainbow of colors because of the way in which the cuts angle in the light. You can see by the above images the small table and the large side crown angles. This is the main reason for the cut’s brilliance. It is hard to find today a diamond cutter who can cut this beautiful stone!!

As I blog this to you, I am waiting to get a new ring with French Cut Diamonds tapering down the sides of a ring.  At the ring’s center is an extremely rare Ruby center.  The entire ring is set in Platinum. I will show an image when I pick up the ring later in the day. This ring has taken 6 months to create.

You will tell me if it was worth the wait?

Have fun today!

Gerald

The Heart Shaped Diamond

LOVE,

Everyone loves love! I LOVE LOVE!! I am in LOVE ! There is nothing like it!

In the diamond world, the Heart Shaped Diamond are cut in many shapes of hearts. Fat, little wings (the shoulders of the Heart shape), Flat wings, or shoulders. Long or skinny. All these different variations have soo many different looks for everyone to LOVE!

Oh! Strangely enough, of the total number of women in the world, only 1/2 of them like the Heart Shaped Diamonds. Odd, right. Who would have thought?

Because of that Heart shaped diamonds are a rare commodity! So when it comes to pricing Heart Shaped diamonds. When cut, the Heart Shaped diamond creates a lot of waste in the rough, original diamond crystal. Most diamond dealers don’t carry them and when you find a dealer who does, you will be paying more for them for that reason.

I like this shape because it is LOVE to me, and I Love LOVE!

How Corny am I! ?

Yes I am Corny!

 

Have a good start of the week!

Gerald