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Mouawad Buys Biggest ‘Dynasty’ Diamond
The 51.38-carat stone was one of five diamonds cut from a 179-carat piece of rough mined in Russia.
The Mouawad Group paid $10 million for the D color, VVS1 clarity “Dynasty” diamond, purchasing via an auction Alrosa held on its online trading platform last Thursday.
Moscow—Mouawad Group has purchased the 51.38-carat “Dynasty” diamond, the largest of the five stones Alrosa cut from a 179-carat rough diamond.
The price paid for the diamond, a round brilliant the GIA graded as D color and VVS1 clarity with a triple excellent cut, was not disclosed, though Alrosa did say that the sale of all five diamonds totaled $10 million.
It is the highest quality diamond of its size ever cut and polished by Alrosa and is also now the most expensive stone ever sold by the diamond mining company.
Alrosa unearthed the 179-carat rough diamond in 2015 at the Nyurbinskaya kimberlite pipe in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) and called it “The Romanovs,” a nod to Romanov-era ruler Peter the Great, who ordered the development of the country’s diamond deposits.
It cut and polished the stone at its facilities in Moscow, placing cutters on week-long leaves from time to time because of the stress and intensity of the job, and unveiled the five resulting stones last August. (The entire collection has the same name as its largest stone, “The Dynasty.”)
In December, the diamond miner announced that four out of the five smaller Dynasty diamonds, which ranged in size from 16.67 to 1.39 carats, found buyers, but it pulled the 51.38-carat diamond from the sale because it did not receive a bid for the stone that it deemed to be high enough.
In a joint statement provided by Alrosa, Fred and Pascal Mouawad said the company plans to add the Dynasty to its collection of historic diamonds, which is described on the Mouawad website as “museum quality.”
Among the historic diamonds once owned by the family is the famous Taylor-Burton diamond, which Robert Mouawad bought in the 1970s. It has since been sold to a private collector, a company spokesperson told National Jeweler back in 2011.
“What attracted us to the Dynasty is not only its exceptional quality but the transparency of its history and the fact it’s the largest and most valuable diamond ever sold by Alrosa,” the Mouawads said. “It’s a rare gem with a remarkable record.”
Editor’s note: This story was corrected post-publication to reflect the fact that $10 million was the price paid for the entire collection, not just the 51-carat Dynasty
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