Style Edit: How Graff and yellow diamonds forged a gem of a partnership – founder Laurence Graff began it by naming the Star of Bombay, and now a Paris exhibition charts its brilliant success
It was then that the Star of Bombay – a historic stone – received the renowned Graff treatment. Re-cut and polished to enhance its natural colour, the 47.39-carat square emerald-cut stone was the first to be named by the brand’s founder Laurence Graff OBE, giving rise to what has become a signature for the storied maison.
The 107.46-carat fancy yellow diamond Graff Sunflower, 118.08-carat fancy vivid yellow Delaire Sunrise, and 132.55-carat Golden Empress are just three more of the exceptional stones that have built upon Graff’s reputation in the delicate craft of yellow diamonds in the years that have followed.
“Yellow diamonds bring so much joy. It is an honour to be inspired by stones that radiate such beauty. The yellow diamonds we work with are exceptional in quality, cut and quantity. Very few jewellers have the luxury of such a wide range of colour,” explained Anne-Eva Geffroy, design director at Graff.
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On July 4 – in celebration of haute couture week – Graff opened the striking “Sunrise: A Celebration of Graff Yellow Diamonds” exhibition, showcasing the maison’s heritage and carefully cultivated reputation in rare yellow diamond artistry through the decades. Graff’s flagship store on Rue Saint-Honoré was the venue, a boutique designed by Peter Marino and itself a work of art, said to have been inspired by Claude Monet’s lily pads.
Francois Graff, CEO of the British jewellers, called the exhibition “the most significant collection of yellow diamonds that has ever been brought together in one place”.
The exhibition comprised a range of high jewellery necklaces, earrings, rings and jewels based on tribal inspirations, all of which speak to Graff’s distinct stone-led identity.
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The centrepiece of the exhibition is a newly unveiled high jewellery necklace featuring a 30-carat fancy intense yellow pear-shaped centre stone. The yellow diamond was the starting point for the design of the necklace, explained Geffroy: “Before we design, we study each diamond carefully to uncover the secrets that lie within its depths. Only then do we design, and when we do, we work to accentuate the natural beauty of each stone.”
The shape of the necklace is designed to enhance the natural beauty and shape of the pear-shaped yellow diamond, allowing the diamond’s colour to radiate warmth and joy, and “give a golden sunshine glow”.
In this case, a halo of white and yellow diamonds encases the central stone, arranged to suggest the rays of the sun, while white diamonds embellish the chain. In total an additional 138 carats of white and yellow designs complete the high jewellery necklace.
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The necklace is a testament to Graff’s design ethos and the reputation of its seasoned artisans in the London atelier, as well as showing the importance of rare yellow diamonds not only to the maison’s past, but also its future.
- In 1974, the brand re-cut a stone which founder Laurence Graff named the Star of Bombay, and other large yellow diamonds have followed such as the Graff Sunflower, Delaire Sunrise and Golden Empress
- Graff just opened the ‘Sunrise: A Celebration of Graff Yellow Diamonds’ exhibition at its flagship store on Paris’ Rue Saint-Honoré – a boutique designed by Peter Marino, inspired by Claude Monet’s lily pads