World Famous Heart-Shaped Jewelry

The \”heart shape\” often conjures up thoughts of love and romance. It has worked its way into our treasured annual holidays like St. Valentine\’s Day, into greeting cards and gifts, and into our jewelry designs as well. As we all know, jewelry is often made out of precious metals like gold and silver, and precious gems like diamonds and emeralds, and by incorporating the \”heart shape\” we are produce an object that displays the eternal ideas of romance, love, caring, and belonging. We will now explore the origins of heart jewelry, the \”heart shape symbol\”, and the world\’s most famous heart-shaped diamond.

The \”heart symbol\” has been around for years, used to refer to the spiritual, emotional, moral, and intellectual core of humans. It\’s often depicted as \”red\” as this symbolizes blood (as it is the heart that pumps blood through the body) and strong emotions…and what emotion can possibly be stronger than that of true love?

Finding a true heart-shaped diamond is a rare event, but they do exist. For example, the most rare and famous of these is the \”Blue Heart\” (also called the Eugenie Blue) diamond. Many people consider it to be the best example of a blue diamond that the world has ever seen. The only diamond that can rival its fame is perhaps the Hope Diamond, but with the unique heart shape of the \”Blue Heart\”, it really stands out in the crowd. From the standpoint of pure elegance and simplicity, there are few diamonds that can hold a candle to the \”Blue Heart\”.

Weighing in at 30.82 metric carats, it\’s debatable whether the \”Blue Heart\” diamond is of African or Indian origin. Antanik Ekyanan cut the rough diamond in Neuilly, Paris in either 1909 or 1910. The dimensions of this beautiful gem are: 20mm x 19mm x 12mm.

The diamond wound up in the possession of an Argentinian woman named Mrs. Unzue, who had it set into a corsage. It was sold to Cartier in 1910. When it was sold to Van Cleef and Arpels in 1953 it was still in the corsage setting.

The next stop of this precious heart jewelry gem was an European family, who then sold it to a gentleman named Harry Winston. The year was 1959, and he placed this diamond into a ring, and subsequently sold it to Marjorie Merriweather Post. Marjorie Merriweather Post eventually donated it to the Smithsonian Institution located in Washington, D.C. It is here at the Smithsonian that this wonderful example of heart jewelry is currently on display. As a bit of nostalgic history and trivia, it\’s interesting to note that at one point the Blue Heart Diamond, the Hope Diamond, and the Heart of Eternity were all on display at the Smithsonian Institution.

If you want to find out more about heart jewelry or open heart jewelry, then visit Betsy Johnson\’s blogs.

categories: heart jewelry,jewelry,diamonds,gifts,presents,for her,holidays