A super diamond for every daughter. The Japanese buyer of the 102.39-carat flawless oval D Color diamond, sold at auction at Sotheby’s in Hong Kong, has decided to name the gem Maiko Star, after his second daughter. The same collector had already purchased another 88.22 carat diamond, also from Sotheby’s, in April 2019. In this case he had called it by the name of his first daughter: Manami Star. The paternal gift had a non-negligible price, even if it is not an absolute record: the equivalent of 15.7 million US dollars.
The diamond was offered without reserve, and was the first auction of its kind for a lot of this importance and intrinsic value. The diamond has attracted tremendous interest and a flurry of offers, quickly taking it from 1 million Hong Kong dollars to over 100 million. Some of these bids were also placed online, the highest of which was Hong Kong $ 85 million (US $ 10.97 million). The highest offer ever made on an online jewel. The winning one, however, came with the traditional telephone from a private collector in Japan.
This extraordinary gem did not need the help of a quote or pre-sale reserve to reach the right price, just the instinctive desire of collectors to own one of the greatest treasures on earth. We are grateful to Diacore for their trust and confidence in allowing us to offer this diamond without reserve, the result of which testifies not only to the importance of this diamond, but to the diamond market more generally.
Patti Wong, president of Sotheby’s Asia
Perfect by every critical criterion, this gem has reached the highest rankings under each of the standards by which the quality of a diamond is judged (the four Cs). The diamond is of color D (the highest grade for a white diamond); of exceptional clarity (it is completely flawless, both internally and externally), and has an excellent sheen and symmetry, the most sought after gradation for the category of oval shapes. Diamond belongs to the rare subgroup comprising less than 2% of all gem diamonds, known as Type IIa. Diamonds in this group are the chemically purest type of diamond and often have exceptional optical clarity.
The 102.39-carat diamond was cut from a 271-carat rough stone discovered in the Victor mine, Ontario, Canada, in 2018. After its discovery, the rough diamond was cut and polished within a year by Diacore, specialists world leader in sourcing, cutting and polishing extraordinary diamonds, to best enhance their brilliance, fire and sparkle.
