Heritage Auctions spotlights fancy diamonds, Kashmir sapphires and Cartier brooches

The color story was strong across the board. Heritage noted that only 1 in 10,000 diamonds carries a fancy color, which helps explain the pull of a sale anchored by a Van Cleef & Arpels ring centered by a 6.88-carat fancy intense yellow diamond, another fancy yellow ring with an 8.27-carat center stone, and a trio of rarer hues that included a 6.45-carat faint pink diamond, a 4.93-carat light pink diamond, and a 10.85-carat fancy dark yellowish brown diamond. For collectors, these stones speak a language beyond carat weight: saturation, origin and proportion matter just as much as size.

Kashmir sapphires gave the catalog its most romance-laden note. One octagonal ring featured a 6.59-carat Kashmir sapphire that American Gemological Laboratories identified as Classic Kashmir Origin, a detail that sharpens its value beyond simple beauty. Heritage described Kashmir sapphires as prized for their velvety texture and cornflower blue color, with stones historically associated with the high-altitude Zanskar Range of the Himalayas. A second Kashmir sapphire in the sale weighed 10.01 carats, while an Oscar Heyman brooch centered by an 18.34-carat yellow sapphire added another burst of saturated color.

Then came the surprise that made the auction feel modern rather than merely monumental: a pair of Cartier duck brooches from the early 1950s, estimated at $10,000 to $15,000. Made of carved chalcedony and coral with sapphire eyes, the signed Cartier, France, 18k figures included a cowboy duck and a rarer Native American chief variant. Heritage described the pair as likely produced in mind-numbingly limited numbers, perhaps for boutique clients or special commissions, which goes a long way toward explaining why they read today as collector catnip rather than novelty.