寶啾寶石報報：6-Carat ‘Farnese Blue’ Diamond Could Garner $5.3M 6卡藍鑽售出5300萬美元

寶啾寶石報報：6-Carat 'Farnese Blue' Diamond Could Garner $5.3M  6卡藍鑽售出5300萬美元

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The 6.16-carat pear-shaped "Farnese Blue" diamond will be on the auction block at Sotheby's Geneva on May 15. It has made its way through some of Europe's most important families for the past three centuries.

 March 22, 2018

Geneva--A historic blue diamond that's been in the same family for more than three centuries will hit the market for the first time this spring. 

"The Farnese Blue," a 6.16-carat pear shaped fancy dark gray-blue diamond, will be offered at the Magnificent Jewels and Noble Jewels sale at Sotheby's Geneva on May 15, where it is expected to sell for between $3.7 million and $5.3 million. 

It was uncovered in the Golconda mines of India, which also produced the famous Hope and Wittelsbach diamonds. 

The stone was given to Elisabeth Farnese, Queen of Spain (1692-1766) and descendant of Pope Paul III, following her wedding to King Philip V of Spain, grandson of Louis XIV, King of France.

The wedding was celebrated in Parma, Italy in 1714, after the War of the Spanish Succession, which had depleted the country's finances. To be able to offer a suitable dowry for the new queen, the Spanish government sent word to its colonies, demanding they send wedding presents to Madrid. 

Then, in August 1715, the Golden Fleet sailed from Cuba: 12 ships carrying a fortune in gold bullion and emeralds. But after only 10 days of sailing, a hurricane destroyed most of the fleet in the gulf of Florida. Only one ship survived. 

The emeralds were thought to be lost in one of the sunken ships, but one diamond made its way to Spain: a pear-shaped blue diamond, gifted to the new Spanish queen by the governor of the Philippine Islands.  

For the next 300 hundred years, as Elisabeth and Philip of Spain's descendants married, the stone was passed down through four of the most important royal families in Europe: Spain, France, Italy and Austria. 

Elisabeth Farnese passed it to her favorite son, Philip (1720-1765), Duke of Parma and founder of the House of Bourbon-Parma. When he died, his son Ferdinand inherited the jewel, which then passed to his son, Louis I, made King of Etruria, during Napoleon's invasion of Italy, followed by his grandson, Charles II, who become Duke of Lucca, following the Congress of Vienna in 1815. 

Charles II had a tie-pin setting created for the stone. He abdicated in 1849 and the title of Duke of Parma passed to his son, Charles III, who was assassinated just five years later. The Farnese Blue then was inherited by Charles II's grandson, Robert I (1848-1907), the last ruling Duke of Parma.  

Robert I sought refuge in Austria after the unification of Italy. During his exile, the diamond was mounted on a diadem that had belonged to his mother, Louise Marie Thérèse of Artois. She had inherited the jewel from her aunt and adoptive mother, Marie-Thérèse de France, the first child of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette and their only child to survive the French Revolution. It is believed that the diamonds that adorn the diadem belonged to Marie-Antoinette herself. 

After the death of Robert I in 1907, his son Elias of Bourbon, Duke of Parma, inherited both the diadem and the Farnese Blue. 

These jewels even have a written record of their journey, thanks to a detailed inventory of the family jewelry compiled by Maria Anna von Habsburg (1882-1940), Archduchess of Austria.

The Farnese Blue has been kept a secret by the family and family jewelers over the centuries and hidden in a royal casket.

寶啾寶石報報：Tiffany Sees Q4 Comps Rise, Outlines Priorities 帝芬尼去年第四季業績提升

寶啾寶石報報：Tiffany Sees Q4 Comps Rise, Outlines Priorities  

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Tiffany saw same-store sales increase in both the fourth quarter and full year 2017, with fashion and designer jewelry outperforming sales of engagement rings for the New York-based jeweler.

March 16, 2018

New York--Tiffany & Co. reported Friday that its fourth quarter comps increased as its new CEO outlined six priorities for the company going forward, including a focus on omnichannel and store renovations.

In the Americas, Tiffany's same-store fourth quarter sales rose 5 percent (4 percent on a constant-exchange-rate basis) year-over-year while total sales in the period also rose 5 percent (flat on a constant-exchange-rate basis).  

Total net sales were up 5 percent to $619 million in Q4 and rose 2 percent (1 percent on a constant-exchange-rate basis) to $1.9 billion for the full year.

The Americas started 2017 with a decline in sales, but improved as the year progressed, allowing the retailer to finish with a slight increase. Tiffany saw higher spending from local customers in the market, with sales to tourists unchanged year-over-year.

Globally, Tiffany's fourth-quarter comps were up 3 percent (1 percent on a constant-exchange-rate basis) and net sales grew 9 percent (6 percent on a constant-exchange-rate basis) to $1.3 billion. 

For the year, same-store sales were flat on both a reported and a constant-exchange-rate basis. Net global sales were up 4 percent to $4.2 billion, with sales growing in most regions. 

Product-wise, Tiffany said sales of fashion and designer jewelry, its new fragrance, watches and home and accessories were strong. Engagement ring sales were weaker, ending 2017 down when compared with the previous year.  

Tiffany's fourth quarter and full year earnings call held Friday morning—a marathon call that lasted nearly two hours and included Tiffany taking calls from analysts, which the retailer has not done in the past—sounded similar to the one held Wednesday morning by Signet Jewelers.

Both retailers are under new leadership, and both outlined multi-step plans to improve sales that contained like elements: emphasizing omnichannel, improving the in-store experience, fine-tuning the product assortment and making the company more efficient overall. 

The Tiffany brand is healthy, CEO Alessandro Bogliolo, who came on board in October, said Friday, but it also has "a tremendous opportunity to grow." 

Also on the call, Bogliolo shared a few details of the new jewelry line coming soon from Reed Krakoff. It will feature platinum and diamonds—the first for Tiffany in "many years," Bogliolo said—and will be an "addictive" type of product that is "very nice surprise for the market." 

He also mentioned watches, particularly women's watches, as a priority for the retailer going forward.  

Tiffany's store count remained relatively unchanged year-over-year. The retailer said it opened nine new stores in 2017 but closed seven. 

As of Jan. 31, Tiffany had a total of 315 stores worldwide, including 124 in the Americas, one less than it had a year ago. 

In 2018, the retailer said it plans to open nine, at least one in each region worldwide; close two; relocate 15, primarily in the Americas and Asia-Pacific markets; and renovate "many" stores.

The pop-up stores that Tiffany experimented with in the latter half of the year in the United States, Canada and Tokyo are not included in the store count.

寶啾寶石報報： 展會調查指業者普遍看好前景

展會調查指業者普遍看好前景

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2018年03月07日

超過4,550家參展商的香港國際鑽石、寶石及珍珠展及香港國際珠寶展圓滿結束。兩項合共吸引來自全球145個國家及地區，約87,000名買家入 場參觀，按年升2%。主辦方香港貿易發展局表示，展會期間訪問了接近1,300名參展商及買家，約九成半表示預期今年銷售表現持平及上升，顯示更多業界對 前景樂觀。

香港貿易發展局副總裁周啟良表示︰「環球經濟持續好轉，去年香港貴重珠寶的出口有3.6%增長。我們樂見兩展的參展商數目創歷年新高，本地及海外買 家數目更刷新紀錄，足證香港作為環球珠寶業採購平台的重要地位。」他續指，參展商普遍滿意參展成績，而來自日本、緬甸、菲律賓、越南、柬埔寨、伊朗、土耳 其的買家的數字錄得顯著升幅，反映這些國家的市場潛力理想，港商應多加發掘當中的機遇。

寶啾寶石報報：US Consumers Spent $6,351 on Their Weddings ring Last Year 美國去年婚戒花費約＄6351美元

寶啾寶石報報：US Consumers Spent $6,351 on Their Weddings ring Last Year 

 美國去年婚戒花費約＄6351美元

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U.S. couples spent less on their weddings and their engagement rings last year but they continue to place importance on bucking tradition. This 18-karat white gold ring from Valani is set with a 2.06-carat Sri Lankan sapphire surrounded by 0.28 carats of diamonds ($5,700). 

 

 February 21, 2018

New York--Consumers' priorities when it comes to weddings sound a lot like their preferences when it comes to retail. They want to have a great experience, and they want something uniquely their own.

Last week, on Valentine's Day, wedding planning website The Knot released the results of the 2017 Real Weddings Study, which surveyed nearly 13,000 couples in the United States who tied the knot last year.

Overall, the study found that the average cost of U.S. weddings dipped in 2017, the first time that has happened in the 11 years The Knot has been doing the survey.

The average cost of a wedding was $33,391, down 5 percent from the high of $35,326 reached in 2016.

Slipping alongside the overall wedding cost was the amount spent on the engagement ring.

In 2017, the average was $5,764, a difference of about $400, or 6 percent, from the 2016 average of $6,163.

(The figures The Knot provides in its annual Real Weddings study are gleaned from a different set of respondents than its biennial Jewelry & Engagement Study; see full explanation below.)

In evaluating the results of the study, The Knot said that while couples are spending less and inviting fewer guests overall, the amount spent per guest reached a high of $268 last year, up from $194 eight years ago.

Couples are trying to make it a better experience for each guest, spending more money on reception amenities like sparklers, selfie stations, candy bars, musicians and lawn games.

The Knot also noted that there were fewer black-tie weddings, which tend to be pricier, and more weddings in non-traditional venues that speak to the couple's personalities, like barns, libraries and even a boxing gym.

The Metropolis Diamond Power Chevron ring from designer Julie Lamb is 14-karat white gold with diamond surround (14.5 points) and retails for $6,000 when set with a 2.5-carat white sapphire.

 

 Outside of the engagement ring, here are a few other figures from the study: average cost of a venue, $15,163; wedding dress, $1,509; favors, $252; photographer, $2,630; and videographer, $1,912.   

The most expensive place to have a wedding in 2017 was—no surprise at all—Manhattan, with the average cost of a wedding nearing $77,000. Weddings in nearby north/central New Jersey ($62,074) and Long Island ($61,113) were the second and third most expensive in the country.

The city/state with the lowest average wedding cost in 2017 was Utah at $18,516.

 

The study also showed that today, the bride and groom split the cost almost equally with the bride's parents. The parents footed the bill for, on average, 44.5 percent of the wedding while the couple contributed 41.1 percent. Other contributors included the groom's parents (12.7 percent) and other (1.79 percent).

The Real Weddings Study is one of the studies The Knot conducts on a regular basis. It comes out every year and acts as a barometer for overall wedding spending in the U.S.

Every other year, The Knot publishes its Jewelry & Engagement Study, which focuses on trends surrounding the proposal, including how much couples are spending on engagement rings.

The latest Jewelry & Engagement Study came out last year. It surveyed 14,000 couples, a mix of engaged and newly married pairs, and showed that the average amount spent on an engagement ring is now $6,351.

寶啾寶石報報：5 Things to Know About … Conch Pearls 關於孔克珠

5 Things to Know About … Conch Pearls

This ring from Assael features two natural conch pearls and 4.51 carats of diamonds set in platinum ($150,000).

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 Everyone knows about oyster pearls; their luster and beauty make for classic and timeless jewelry.  

But for the gem connoisseur looking for something a little different, there's a mollusk that creates a pearl in shades of pink and peach that resemble some of the best colors of coral.

Conch pearls are produced naturally by the queen conch mollusk, found in the Caribbean. Most are elongated or baroque in shape; near-round specimens are extremely rare.

They were used in the Victorian era for the carving of cameos, and became even more popular during King Edward's reign. They also can be seen in some Art Nouveau jewelry pieces.

Their popularity lasted through about the Art Deco period, after which they disappeared from the scene for a while before regaining popularity in the late '70s and 1980s.

This was due in part to American professional diver Sue Hendrickson, who started buying the pearls fishermen in the Caribbean found when emptying shells for sale. She eventually built up a collection of high-quality pearls and helped reintroduce them into jewelry design.

Now, this pink-hued pearl is used in designs from well-known brands such as Mikimoto, Tiffany & Co., Harry Winston, Chopard and Hemmerle.

Here are five facts about conch pearls that you might not have known.

1. They differ from oyster pearls in that they are non-nacreous.

Conch pearls are calcareous concretions of the queen conch mollusk, a large sea snail with a spiral-shaped shell. They have a pearl structure but, like melo melo pearls, are non-nacreous, according to the Gemological Institute of America.

A queen conch mollusk shellThey also weigh more than an oyster pearl and are sized by carat weight instead of millimeters, and are harder and more resistant to erosion.

But conch pearls and nacreous pearls do have the same chemical composition; the only difference between them is their polycrystalline structures, according to the GIA.

2. The finest examples often exhibit a "flame-like structure" that's visible to the naked eye.

Because they are formed by concentric layers of fibrous calcium within the queen conch, the layering often produces a flame-like structure.

The most coveted have a vibrant chatoyancy that allows the flame to be visible to the naked eye; in fact, flame vibrancy is one of the most important determinants of value for a conch pearl, along with its shape and size.

Conch pearls also can come in a variety of colors, ranging from pink to white to brownish, though pink is the most common.  

Sonny Sethi of Tara Pearls said in Tucson that the conch pearls that are "baby-bubble-gum pink" in color continue to be the most in demand for them.

A loose conch pearl from Assael3. The queen conch is extremely rare.

There are a range of numbers in regards to the rarity of conch pearls, but most sources have it somewhere between one conch pearl found in every 10,000 shells to one in every 20,000.

Sethi told me that in his experience, one in 2,000 shells holds a pearl, one in 10,000 contains a conch that can be used in jewelry; and one in 100,000 holds a gem-quality piece.

Adding to this is the fact that the queen conch lives in fairly shallow water, is slow to grow and has a late maturation that makes it susceptible to overfishing, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

In fact, it's in decline because of overfishing and is now a threatened species.

Queen conch was once abundant in the Florida Keys but, after a collapse in conch fisheries in the 1970s, it is now illegal to commercially or recreationally harvest queen conch there.

It also has been listed in the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) agreement since 1992 and since then, most of the countries involved in the trade of queen conch have been consistently agreeing to a number of actions to improve its sustainability and legality.

According to CITES, the queen conch is making a slow comeback.

4. The idea of a cultured conch pearl is a relatively new idea.

In the development of all pearls, nacreous or non-nacreous, an irritant gets trapped inside the mollusk and the pearl begins forming around it.

Because a queen conch shell has only one entrance, it is more difficult for an irritant to become trapped inside and start the pearl formation.

This is why it has been so difficult to cultivate them, until very recently.

In 2009, scientists at Florida Atlantic University's Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute developed proprietary seeding techniques to produced beaded (nucleated) and non-beaded cultured pearls from the queen conch.

After less than two years of research and experimentation, researchers Héctor Acosta-Salmón and Megan Davis produced more than 200 cultured conch pearls. The researchers then took the specimens for laboratory testing.  

I reached out to the university to see what progress has been made since then, but they said they didn't have any additional information at this time.  

This bracelet from Tara Pearls features 20 pieces of natural conch pearls weighing 23.60 total carats, 1.27 carats of rubies, 0.42 carats of fancy diamonds and 2.62 carats of white diamonds, all set in 18-karat white gold ($79,485). 
And, according to a 2015 article in the GIA's Gems & Gemology, the Laboratoire Français de Gemmologie analyzed eight samples of cultured conch pearls from a farm in Honduras.

The article said the cultured conch pearl samples had a "luster (that) was porcelaneous, and the surface was very smooth and homogenous with no defects. Almost all the samples possessed a typical but subtle flame pattern."

Though the article noted at the time that "queen conch pearl culture is undergoing intensive development," with the quality improving with each harvest, lab director Olivier Segura said Monday via email that the recent events in the Caribbean have had "huge consequences" on their farming.

Sethi told me no cultured conch pearls have yet hit the market, and Segura noted that while the farmers had improved techniques, in his opinion, the culturing of conch pearls is "not yet a market issue."

5. Demand in the United States is steady.

While conch pearls are in demand once again, thanks to their uniqueness, that demand is staying fairly consistent, Sethi said.  

This is not that surprising, given their rarity and higher pricing, which makes them accessible only to a certain customer.

Since they got into the conch pearl market seven or eight years ago and started advertising it, Sethi said not much has changed for them in this sector.

"The demand is there, but it's only at the very elite level," he commented, adding that this means conch pearls can only be sold at stores with a deep understanding of the gemstone.

寶啾寶石報報： Sotheby’s Offers Rare 102ct., D-Flawless Diamond

寶啾寶石報報： Sotheby's Offers Rare 102ct., D-Flawless Diamond 

 

 

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Sotheby's has unveiled a rare white diamond that, it claims, is the only known round brilliant-cut diamond over 100 carats possessing the highest cut, color and clarity grades.

Sotheby's Diamonds, the group's retail boutique, revealed the 102.34-carat, D-color, flawless stone to mark the first anniversary of its salon on London's New Bond Street, the auction house said Thursday.

The polished diamond — which is available for private purchase, rather than at auction — originated from a 425-carat rough that De Beers unearthed in Botswana. Diacore, a South Africa-based manufacturer, spent six months cutting and polishing it in Johannesburg and New York.

The round shape is the most sought-after for colorless stones, as it gives the most "light and life," Sotheby's said. However, in auction history, not even one of the seven 100-carat-plus, D-color diamonds that have sold was brilliant-cut.

Large, round-brilliant diamonds are rare because cutters generally try to maximize carat weight when working with the rough. That usually means choosing a fancy shape such as cushion, emerald or pear, the auction house explained.

"In the course of my long career, which has brought me close to some of the greatest stones the earth has ever yielded, I have not encountered anything quite like this," said Patti Wong, founder and chairman of Sotheby's Diamonds.

"With its outstanding weight, its perfect color, clarity and cut, it is a masterpiece of nature brought to life by human hand, blazing with a brilliant firework-like display of almost every color on the spectrum — mesmerizing to behold," she added.

The diamond is on view to the public until Friday at Sotheby's galleries on New Bond Street.

Image: Sotheby's

寶啾寶石報報： Hong Kong jewellery exports seen to prosper in 2018

Hong Kong jewellery exports seen to prosper in 2018

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2018/01/02

Hong Kong's sales of fine jewellery pieces are expected to strengthen in 2018, fueled mainly by items with fine designs and craftsmanship, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) said in its latest export index report. 

Platinum jewellery is also expected to be highly sought after largely due to the metal's sluggish price while demand for gold jewellery remains stable, data from the HKTDC Export Index 4Q17 showed.

Sales of luxury watches, meanwhile, are seen to stay steady while demand for fashionable watches is on the rise. Smart watches with functions such as fitness tracking, smart notifications and mobile connectivity are likely to remain popular, HKTDC said.

Overall, the council expects Hong Kong exports to increase in value by 6 percent while the volume of exports is anticipated to grow by 4 percent in 2018. HKTDC Director of Research Nicholas Kwan attributed the rise to broad-based expansion in investment, trade and consumption, coupled with strengthening consumer and business confidence.

"Overall demand will remain sturdy with the expansion in both developed and emerging economies," said Kwan. "This year's positive export trend will likely carry on to next year, though the pace of growth is expected to slow. But there are formidable challenges facing Hong Kong exporters, such as rising Sino-US trade tensions, the possibility of a faster-than-expected tightening of US monetary policy and escalating geopolitical tension."

The latest HKTDC Export Index also showed that the confidence level of Hong Kong exporters had improved substantially compared to the previous year. The index monitors the current export performance of Hong Kong traders and gauges their near-term prospects. Reading above and below 50 indicate positive and negative sentiment, respectively. Overall, the average HKTDC Export Index level in 2017 was 47, significantly higher than last year's 36.8.