Fancy light pink diamond. Photo Sotheby's

The round brilliant-cut Fancy Light Pink Diamond weighing 5.08 carats. Estimate 500,000 — 700,000 - Lot Sold: 1,426,500 USD

Accompanied by GIA report no. 1142684724 stating that the diamond is Fancy Light Pink, Natural Color, VVS2 clarity.

Colored diamonds of any hue are among the rarest gemstones in the world. Indeed, the GIA estimates that fewer than one in 10,000 fashioned diamonds qualifies as a “fancy” color of any kind. Among all colored diamonds, perhaps no color is as desirable as pink. Owing their color to natural distortions in the crystal lattice, pink diamonds have been admired and collected throughout history and form the centerpieces of some of the world’s greatest collection. The
Great Table, a 400 carat stone, was named by legendary traveler Jean-Baptiste Tavernier in 1642 and is currently apart of the Crown Jewels of Iran. Queen Elizabeth II received another extraordinary pink diamond, the Williamson, as a wedding present in 1947, and in 2010, Graff purchased a 24.78 carat pink diamond from Sotheby’s Geneva for the historic price of $46.2 million, the most ever paid for a diamond or jewel at auction.

While any pink diamond is exceedingly rare and generates great excitement at auction, a round pink diamond is rarer still. Most diamond cutters use a modified cut on colored diamond rough to emphasize the color within the stone, reserving round cuts for white diamonds. This 5.08 carat stone represents one of the largest round, fancy colored pink diamonds to ever come to auction and is an extraordinary opportunity for any collector.

Sotheby's. Important Jewels. New York | 20 Sep 2012 - www.sothebys.com