Harry Winston

History

Legacy

Noted diamonds Winston owned

A–C

• The Arcots, first, recut by Winston to, respectively. Originally the stones were thought to be a match, but when Winston bought them, removed them from their settings and discovered they were not, he decided to recut them slightly to improve their clarity and brilliance. Both were either colorless or near-colorless, and antique pear-shaped brilliants.
• The Anastasia, three emerald cuts weighing, all D color and Flawless clarity. Cut from a rough crystal weighing Winston had purchased in 1972, largest gem named after Anastasia Nikolaevna, daughter of Czar Nicholas II.
• The Ashoka, originally a, colorless, modified elongated cushion brilliant. Purchased by Winston from a Chinese dealer in 1947; subsequently sold and repurchased several times by the firm. Stone was recut slightly in 1977 from its original weight of before it was sold again as a ring.
• The Blue Heart, a, blue, heart-shaped brilliant. After the cut was made, Cartier sold it to the Unzue family of Argentina in 1910. It reappeared in Paris in 1953 where it was purchased by an important European titled family, then purchased by Harry Winston in 1959. Winston mounted it in a ring and sold it to Marjorie Merriweather Post, who later donated it to the Smithsonian Institution.
• The Briolette of India, a, colorless, briolette cut.
• The Cornflower Blue, pear brilliant; round brilliant, blue, cut from South African rough which Winston purchased in 1958. The larger stone was sold in 1969 as the pendant for a diamond necklace. Winston repurchased it two years later, then sold it to a Middle Eastern client. The round brilliant was set as a ring and sold in 1969. In 1987 the pear brilliant was auctioned in Geneva, Switzerland.
• The Countess Széchényi, a, D color, pear-shaped brilliant. Purchased by Winston in 1959 from namesake and recut to a flawless. Sold to an American industrialist in 1966.
• The Crown of Charlemagne, a, sky blue, Old European cut brilliant.

  D–I

• The Deal Sweetener, a diamond plus four smaller stones, D color and Flawless, emerald cut. In 1974 Winston bought a large parcel of diamonds worth $24,500,000—at that time the largest individual sale of diamonds in history. Harry Oppenheimer, head of De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd., arranged the transaction. When Winston asked Oppenheimer, "How about a little something to sweeten the deal?" Harry Oppenheimer pulled a rough diamond out of his pocket and rolled it across the table. Winston picked up the stone, smiled, and said simply, "Thanks." It was cut into five gems, the largest being named the Deal Sweetener. Other gems cut from the crystal: An emerald cut of, plus three pear shapes of 10.80, 4.19 and, respectively. All were sold that same year.
• The Deepdene, a, yellow, antique cushion brilliant. Purchased by Winston in 1954 from Cary W. Bok, then sold the following year to Eleanor Loder from Canada. Resurfaced in 1971 and put up for auction at Christie's in Geneva. This stone is also the largest known diamond to receive irradiation treatment, which improved its color.
• The Étoile du Désert, a, D-color, pear-shaped brilliant. Acquired by Winston in 1977 and mounted in a diamond necklace. Sold the same year to a Saudi Arabian prince. The necklace contained over of diamonds, among them a D-color Flawless clarity marquise cut.
• The Graff Pink of 24.78 carats, graded Fancy Intense Pink colour and with a November 2010 Sotheby's auction pre-sale estimate price of US$27 million to US$38 million. Sotheby's sold the rare pink diamond ring for $46.16 million to London jeweler Laurence Graff.
• The Hope, a, Fancy Dark Grayish-Blue, antique cushion brilliant. He bought this diamond in 1949 and later donated it to Smithsonian in 1958. He sent the diamond to the museum via a registered first-class mail. The package in which he sent the Hope diamond is found among the Smithsonian's collection.
• The Idol's Eye, a, Light Blue, semi-triangular modified antique brilliant. Allegedly first seen in 1607 when the East India Company seized the stone from its owner, a Persian prince named Ragab, as payment for debts. Resurfaced in 1906 in the possession of Sultan Abdul Hamid II. The stone, along with the Hope Diamond and Star of the East, were stolen from the sultan by his messenger and sold to French pawn shops. The stones were intended to provide a comfortable retirement for the sultan. Appeared at the June 1909 auction held in Paris by gem dealer and collector Selim Habib, where it was purchased by a Spanish nobleman. It then came into the possession of a London bank and eventually was bought by a Dutch diamond dealer, from whom Winston purchased the stone in November 1946. Winston sold the diamond in 1947 to May Bonfils Stanton, daughter of the publisher and co-founder of The Denver Post. It was mounted as the center stone in a diamond necklace with eighty-six other diamonds totalling. In 1963, after Bonfils Stanton's death, the gem was sold at auction in New York City. Renowned jeweler Lawrence Graff of London also owned the stone.
• The Indore Pears, but later recut to respectively, colorless, both pear-shaped antique brilliants. Originally owned by Maharaja Tukoji Rao III Holkar who was forced to abdicate due to a scandal in 1926. Despite his abdication he remained very wealthy and retained the diamonds. He married American Nancy Anne Miller in 1928 amid much international publicity. Miller converted to Hinduism and after marrying was known as Maharani Shamista Devi Holkar. Winston purchased the two diamonds in 1946 from the former maharaja and his wife, both of whom had worn the stones on many occasions. The gems were recut to and were featured as his 'Court of Jewels' exhibit. Winston sold the gems in 1953 to a client from Philadelphia and repurchased them in 1958. They were then sold to a New York client and were once again purchased in 1976 and sold to a member of a royal family. In 1981 and again in 1987, the two noted diamonds were sold at auction in Geneva.
• The Isadora Diamond, an yellow diamond worth $5–6 million, first worn by Whoopi Goldberg at the 74th Academy Awards, then later worn by Kate Hudson and Liliane Montevecchi in the 2003 film How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. In the film, it's called the "Isadora Diamond", named after Isadora Duncan. The necklace was sold shortly after filming finished.

  J–M

• The Jonker, twelve gems, the largest weighing, colorless, various shapes. Discovered as a rough crystal in January 1934 and purchased by Winston from the Diamond Producers Association in London in 1935. It was the first time a major diamond crystal was cleaved in the United States. The largest diamond, the Jonker I, was a emerald cut, but it was recut in 1937 to to give it a more oblong outline. Winston is said to have loved the stone and refused to sell it for many years, using it instead for display at various charitable exhibitions, set in a platinum necklace with 110 baguette-cut diamonds. He sold the gem in 1951 to King Farouk of Egypt, who went into exile the following year, taking the gem with him. It was unheard of until 1959 when it was rumored that Queen Ratna of Nepal had been seen wearing it. It was later confirmed that Farouk did indeed sell the diamond to Nepal for a reported price of $100,000. It was later sold in 1974 at a Hong Kong auction for $4 million. A marquise shape and ten emerald cuts comprise the other diamonds cut from the crystal, the larger gems included emerald cuts of 41.30, 35.45, 30.70, 25.66 and 24.41 carats. Jonkers IV and VI were sold to American clients while the other three were sold to Indian maharajas. The smallest Jonker satellite stone, Jonker XII, a emerald cut, was auctioned in New York in October 1975.
• The Lesotho, eighteen different diamonds, pale brown, various shapes. The diamond was discovered by Ernestine Ramaboa in May 1967 at the Letseng-la-Terai diggings in Lesotho. The crystal was sold at auction in Maseru to a South African dealer who then sold it to a European dealer. It was later purchased in Geneva by Winston. In 1969, he had it cut into eighteen stones totalling. The largest three gems were a emerald-cut, a emerald cut, and a marquise brilliant, named Lesotho I, II and III, respectively. The marquise was bought by Aristotle Onassis for his wife, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. The gem was sold at her estate sale auction for over $2 million.
• The Liberator, four gems weighing, D color, three emerald cuts and a marquise, respectively. Winston purchased the Venezuelan crystal in 1943 and cut four stones from it. The three smaller gems were set in a clip and the largest was mounted in a ring and sold to the forementioned Mrs. May Bonfils Stanton, in 1946. In 1962 Winston reacquired the diamond from Mrs. Stanton's estate and had it recut from its original weight of down to. He sold it to an American client in 1966, who sold it at auction in New York on December 7, 1972.
• The Louis XIV, a, D color and Flawless clarity, antique pear-shaped brilliant. Reportedly the gem belonged to King Louis XIV of France but nothing of its history before Harry Winston bought it can be verified. Winston purchased the diamond in 1958 from the estate of Chrysler heiress Thelma Chrysler Foy. He then had it recut from down to a flawless. He also obtained a oval sapphire from the Foy estate. In 1959 the diamond was mounted as the center stone in a tiara that also contained six smaller pear-shaped diamonds totalling, and 233 smaller diamonds totalling. The diamond was exhibited at the Louvre in 1962, along with the Hope Diamond, as part of the Ten Centuries of French Jewelry exhibition. In 1963 it was removed from the tiara and sold together with the Winston Diamond to Eleanor Loder from Canada, who wore the two stones in a pair of earrings. The Louis XIV was sold again in Geneva in 1981 from Loder's estate.
• The Mabel Boll, a, near colorless, elongated emerald-cut. The diamond originally weighed and was owned by Mabel Boll, the much-married American socialite whose name was often in the news in the 1920s. Boll collected nicknames like she collected jewelry: in 1921 she was hailed by newspapers as "Broadway's most beautiful blonde." She married Colombian coffee king Hernando Rocha in 1922, who presented her with a million dollars' worth of jewelry, mostly in the form of diamonds. The press referred to her as the "$250,000-a-day bride." She gained her most last nickname, "Queen of Diamonds", because she often appeared in public wearing all her jewelry. It was said that the rings she wore on her left hand alone were worth more than $400,000. When she died in 1949 Winston purchased the large emerald-cut diamond. According to Boll, the stone had originally been bought from Tiffany & Co. Winston slightly recut the stone, which measured, reducing it to and set it in a ring. It was then featured in his Court of Jewels exhibition before being sold to a New York client in 1954. When the client died in 1965, Winston reacquired the diamond to a flawless, and sold it the following year to a European client. At this time it was designed to be worn as a ring or as the center stone to a bracelet set with an addition 112 smaller emerald-cut diamonds totaling.
• The McLean Diamond, a, blue-white colorless, antique cushion brilliant. The diamond was purchased by Harry Winston from the estate of Evalyn Walsh McLean along with other pieces of jewelry including the Hope Diamond and the Star of the East. He sold the McLean Diamond to the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in 1950. The Duchess, a collector of jewelry, wore the stone often and owned it until her death in 1986. It was sold at her estate sale auction in April 1987 for $3.15 million.