Discover Diamonds

The ring and I washed ashore in Naples, where we discovered that for skill, integrity and expertise, our community of jewelers is truly world-class. On a tour of some jaw-dropping inventory, I learned that a few things have changed since my grandfather bought that ring so many years ago.

Have you kept up with the diamond times? Before you expand your diamond wardrobe at the elite shops in the area, consider the rock.

If you answered four, you would be two shy of the current total: six. According to Bruce Yamron, third generation jeweler, president and chief executive officer of Yamron Jewelers at the Waterside Shops—a luxury establishment that boasts the area’s largest selection of "significant," or large and rare diamonds, on hand—the carat weight, clarity, color and cut of a diamond are only part of the story. Cost has entered the equation in large part due to the growing savvy of diamond consumers, and cut now has two meanings: first, the gem’s shape, such as pear or marquise, and then the skill with which the gem has been cut from its "rough" and fashioned.

The Gemological Institute of America (GIA), the world’s leading, nonprofit authority, still offers the general public information about four Cs as opposed to six, but it has recently begun to provide a cut quality grade, albeit just for "standard round brilliant diamonds that fall in the GIA D–Z color range." Most jewelers rely on the GIA before appraising a diamond as "flawless."

"The best cutters are the houses that don’t just maximize a rough’s potential, but strive to make the prettiest diamond," Yamron explained. "You might have a D color, or colorless white diamond, but if it wasn’t cut for the most brilliance, proportion and transparency, it’s not the best." Five minutes into a conversation with Yamron, who has the deep, forceful voice of a head of state, and I realized that only a total ninny would try to give him anything but the best. According to a member of his inner circle, Jacob Tuchman, graduate gemologist and vice president of sales at Yamron’s, the cognoscenti understand that there is a hierarchy in diamond cutting cities. Apparently, the cutters in Bombay get paid by weight, while the cutting houses in New York, Antwerp and Tel Aviv—the world’s other main cutting locations—don’t mind "losing more of a rough because they’re looking for perfection" in symmetry and proportion.

Tuchman helped me try on an exquisite ring with a 9.81-carat pear-shaped white diamond flanked by two-carat pears. The perfect symmetry with which each pear had been cut enhanced their native flawlessness. For a cool $715,000, you can toss the pears into your own private fruit bowl.

Ronald Lee, general manager of Congress Jewelers on Fifth Avenue, another multigenerational family company, gave a threefold answer: intensity of hue, rarity and beauty. Lee discussed all the colors of the diamond rainbow with me in a private office equipped with a microscope and a view of Fifth Avenue. Folding his hands neatly in front of his dark blazer, he explained that white diamonds that rate between O and Z on the GIA color range are more yellowish brown or gray, while colorlessness enhances the innate beauty and scintillation of white diamonds.

Yellow diamonds are graded on their own scale, from light fancy to fancy, intense yellow, and vivid hues. Why go with a yellow diamond instead of another colored gemstone, like a citrine? "Citrines are lovely, but nothing shines like a diamond," said Lee, who illustrated his point with a 10.29-carat fancy intense yellow square-cut diamond ring. He also showed me a 4.03-carat fancy pink diamond, offered at $1.2 million. Fewer than one-tenth of one percent of all mined diamonds are pink, while reds are the rarest of all. Want proof? In April of 1987, a Brazilian fancy purplish-red diamond weighing less than a single carat sold at Christie’s for $880,000.

Beware the diamond that has been processed to appear like a rare colored diamond. Experts can tell the difference. As Ursula M. Pfahl, chief operating officer at Yamron’s put it, "If you don’t know jewelry, know your jeweler." With her hazel-green eyes and chic lemon yellow suit, Pfahl seemed like a walking advertisement for color.

If you have trouble committing to just one color, you might consider buying a diamond with a sliver of another gem inside of it. At Artisans Diamonds, where approximately 50 percent of the diamond rings sold have been designed by the company’s owner, award-winning jewelry designer Paul Terterian, store manager Frank Orsini says that sometimes other gems can form inside diamonds. "It’s usually a ruby, which can hold up under the pressure it takes for the earth to make a diamond out of carbon." In other words, if you know someone born in July, you might consider buying a diamond with her birthstone—the ruby—embedded inside. Orsini conveys the sort of dark-eyed, brooding intensity that you find most often in Bronte novels. His passion seems to emanate from two sources: a commitment to the original designs arrayed in his store, and an interest in bringing beautiful things to every generation. When we spoke for the second time, Orsini told me about a quarter-million-dollar, three-stone white-diamond ring, with a 5.53-carat center round brilliant stone that has been GIA certified "near ideal cut," in a handmade platinum setting with yellow gold accents.

Schmitt of Paul J. Schmitt’s cited Australia as the largest producer, but clarified that only three percent of its diamonds are large and clear enough to be fashioned into gems—including some fancy colored diamonds—while the rest go into industrial applications. "The new mines in Alaska and certain alluvial deposits in Africa might someday shift the diamond landscape," he said, "but most of the gem-quality diamonds are still coming from African countries."

According to the GIA’s published statistics on 2003 diamond production, the lion’s share of diamonds mined comes from Russia (33 million carats), Australia (30.9 million), Botswana (30.5 million), and the Republic of Congo (25 million). South Africa, Canada, Angola and Namibia weighed in at 12.7, 11.2, 5.7 and 1.5 million carats each, but the quality of their diamonds tended to be high. For instance, Australia’s 30.9 million carats fetched $450 million in the marketplace—the exact same amount earned by Namibia’s comparatively small yield of 1.5 million carats. The difference? A diamond fit to be used for a tool bit versus a diamond that will tell your wife of 40 years that you still think she’s the cat’s meow.

The world’s total diamond production in 2003? One-hundred fifty-five million carats mined and sold for $9.24 billion. Can you imagine that as a necklace?

At Yamron’s, seven out of 10 diamonds sold have been cut as round brilliants. The round tends to be popular because it displays a lot of brilliance. "It’s the most traditional shape, and its value stays high," advised Tuchman of Yamron’s. But he urges clients to follow their own tastes and preferences. "If a client likes the shape of an emerald, but wants the brilliance of a round, the modified step cut would work well because it offers extra faceting." The cushion cut, an older cut, is also much in demand, as are StarBursts and Radiants, the trademarked names for modified step cut, emerald cut diamonds.

Hugh Hoare-Ward, retail sales specialist of Port Royal Jewelers on Fifth Avenue—yet another family-owned company of long standing in Naples, with some fascinating antique jewels in cases around the store—identified my ring as a modified step cut square diamond known as the Asscher cut, for a cut popularized by I.J. Asscher and Co. of Amsterdam at the turn of the 20th century. Asscher and Co. cut several gems out of the two largest diamonds ever found—the blue-white Excelsior diamond, 995 carats in the rough, and the 3,106-carat Cullinan diamond, the discovery of which unseated the Excelsior, and remains the world record holder. Stones from the Cullinan, which was found in South Africa, have become part of the crown jewels of Great Britain. Port Royal doesn’t have anything quite as grand, but it boasts both modern and antique jewelry. I saw a natural pearl watch pendant circa 1900, offered at $17,500, and a French art deco diamond bracelet and necklace combo, circa the 1920s, priced at $59,000: All seemed to have been exquisitely made and gleamed in their well-marked cases.

Jason Sherman, co-owner of the Diamond District in Bonita Springs, told me that there’s really no contest: Color wins in a landslide. "With color, you’re paying for the visual difference," he explained, "whereas with clarity, you’re paying for rarity, but the naked eye can’t detect the difference between an SI and a flawless grade of clarity." It was true: He placed a seemingly endless assortment of diamond trays in front of me, including one holding a nine-carat round brilliant for $85,000, and I gravitated towards the highest color grades every time.

I walked into the Diamond District expecting chaos and found serenity instead. I came in anonymously, out of a monsoon-like rain, and asked if I could repair the damage to my appearance in the restroom, a request that was met with total warmth and acceptance. The store’s ubiquitous advertisement—featuring Jason and his partner Todd Schusterman in dark, New York suits leaning against a monstrous, gleaming diamond, promising New York wholesale prices—had me expecting a sort of fast-paced, kill-or-be-killed Lower East Side shopping experience. Instead, I was offered a platter of Norman Love chocolates (served daily) and found my surroundings to be surprisingly upscale. (They’re also offering a night of limousine service with $1,000 purchase.) Two women sat at an elegant wooden desk, surrounded by warm, earth-tone yellow walls and art, looking at velvet trays of diamonds with a sales associate, while several other salespeople stood discreetly behind fresh, well-marked cases filled with loose white diamonds, and platinum and white-gold diamond jewelry.

Sherman said that they had great success with the Circle of Life diamond pendants and expected the new Journey of Life pendant—a drop pendant with five or more diamonds—to be equally successful.

I spoke with Doug Manning, a manager at Dunkin’s Diamonds in Fort Myers, another north-of-the-Naples-border jeweler that rises above its name in much the same way as the Diamond District, and learned that every three to five years will normally work well for appraisals, depending on inflation and market forces. "For example, platinum has at least tripled in value in the last six years," he said. Manning lived and worked in Thailand for six years before coming to Fort Myers, and was often sent to the major cutting houses in Tel Aviv and Bombay for three to four months at a stretch to acquire diamonds and emeralds. He came to Dunkin’s Diamonds less than a year ago, bringing a huge smile and his globetrotting gemological experiences.

Also fairly new to Dunkin’s Diamonds is Gail Carriere, who served as director of training and development at the behemoth Zales before coming to Southwest Florida. Carriere offered advice about how to select jewelry that will maintain or increase in value over time. "Signed designer lines typically will command and hold value more than their generic counterparts. Example: A signed Van Cleef & Arpels diamond ring will command and hold higher value than the same unsigned, often double the value."

Dunkin’s Diamonds features many designer lines in an extraordinary 4,500 square feet of selling space, with several sales associates and five certified bench jewelers on hand. Yet the atmosphere, with its chandeliers, well-marked cases and discreet yet helpful associates, was calm and pleasant. I was particularly taken with a Gregg Ruth natural pink oval diamond ring, offered at $125,000. I also liked the Tycoon line, which offers a specialty cut of a diamond shape on the table (the upper flat facet) of the diamond. The effect is almost like a diamond-within-a-diamond. "We keep selling out of Tycoons!" a young associate said with a laugh.

If you said platinum, you get a gold star—a gold star you should not expose to excessive amounts of chlorine bleach. According to Schmitt of Paul J. Schmitt’s, chlorine dissolves the alloys in gold, making the metal brittle, which can lead to broken prongs. Contrary to popular belief, platinum is actually a very soft metal and thus is not invincible, but it’s incredibly rare and white, and is still the metal of choice for diamonds. If you prefer gold settings, and only anticipate normal exposure to shower and pool water, etc., as opposed to long days of immersion, you should be fine.

When I asked Port Royal Jewelers owner William Boyajian what he wished clients knew before they even set foot in the door, he said, "Don’t be duped into buying duty-free gems in the islands, which may have poor quality of design and slipshod settings, and cause lots of problems. It’s still true that you get what you pay for." At the same time, Boyajian said that the real point is the people. "We love helping everyone find the right diamond."

Every jeweler I spoke with echoed this sentiment. Whether you are buying your first diamond or your 50th, don’t let a pesky thing like advanced knowledge prevent you from swilling the sheer excitement of a luminous rock.