HONG KONG — Chow Tai Fook, the largest jeweler in China, has unveiled its very own crown jewels, a diamond necklace created by celebrated jewelry designer Wallace Chan.
“We want to tell people that we are a jewelry company with heritage, with family generations and also with a sense of cultural identity of Chinese-ness,” said Chow Tai Fook executive director Adrian Cheng.
The necklace, called “A Heritage in Bloom,” is centered on 24 D-color internally flawless diamonds cut from the Cullinan Heritage, a rare 507.55 carat rough diamond that was discovered in the Cullinan Diamond Mine. Many of the world’s most famous diamonds have been uncovered from this South African mine, including The Cullinan Diamond, the world’s largest, which was discovered in 1905 and forms a major part of several of the British Crown Jewels.
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Chow Tai Fook acquired the Cullinan Heritage for $35.3 million in 2010 and spent three years working out how best to cut the rough diamond, which was eventually cut into 24 pieces. Wallace Chan, who was born in Fuzhou and moved to Hong Kong when he was five, is the best-known Chinese jewelry designer — and his Chinese heritage was what Chow Tai Fook wanted for this project. He was given a very broad brief — create something that represents the company’s Chinese roots — but beyond that had total creative freedom.
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“We didn’t want to tell him what to do and limit his creative freedom. We made clear the idea of Chinese-ness is very important, but then let him create freely,” said Cheng, the grandson of Hong Kong billionaire Cheng Yu-tung, who built up the jeweler.
Initially, Chan was asked to create a piece based on the main 104 carat round brilliant diamond, but he’d heard that a total of 24 diamonds were cut from the rough stone and asked if he could use them all.
“They agreed right away and I’m happy they did. Gemstones are living things and as they come from the same family I didn’t want to break up the family. Not only that, they also gave me the green light when I asked to have more DIF diamonds for the piece,” Chan said.
In addition to the Cullinan Heritage, 10,000 white diamonds and 500 pink diamonds were used to create the piece, which is unique in uniting an entire family of diamonds cut from the same rough stone.
Chow Tai Fook didn’t even ask to see preliminary sketches. Given free rein to create a special necklace, Chan did more than that — he created 27 necklaces, or 27 ways of wearing the one piece. No wonder it took him and 21 other craftsmen 47,000 hours to complete the piece, missing several deadlines.
“When it was finished, I hung photographs of the 27 styles around the room. When the chairman walked in, he was surprised. What happened? So many styles,” recalled Chan, who is best known for the “Wallace Cut,” an illusory carving technique that transcends dimensions.
“A Heritage in Bloom” doesn’t have a price tag and don’t expect to see it in a shop window. The necklace’s role is to boost Chow Tai Fook’s brand.
“This piece embodies Chow Tai Fook’s commitment to Chinese culture, patronage of the arts and status as a diamond expert,” said the group’s chairman, Henry Cheng.
Managing director Kent Wong echoed that sentiment, explaining that owning and exhibiting branded pieces with museum-quality pedigrees has become an increasingly important symbol for communicating a luxury jewelry brand’s legitimacy, longevity and value.
“Such pieces signal that a house has heritage, a lasting purpose beyond just commercial activity and relevance as a cultural voice. We believe that discerning luxury consumers expect this. The iconic brands of tomorrow will be set apart by their ability to create, achieve and share one-of-a-kind masterpieces with the world,” Wong said.
Plans are already being hatched to tour the piece sometime next year, a roadshow that will take in Europe. And beyond that there is talk of it becoming the centerpiece of a Chow Tai Fook museum.
“We are hoping to build a small museum where we can showcase our heritage pieces from high jewelry — we kept a few, we didn’t auction them all off — as well as pieces from around the world. And ‘Heritage in Bloom’ will be the anchor,” Adrian Cheng said.
Founded in 1929, Chow Tai Fook has been in the diamond business a long time. Precious stones account for 25 to 30 percent of its revenue — and that sector is growing. Last year it splashed out $150 million to acquire the U.S. diamond company Hearts On Fire and it has seen good growth on the mainland.
“Diamonds are doing well in China, they are seeing single-digit positive growth,” said Adrian Cheng, who puts the demand down to a shift toward celebrating Western occasions such as Valentine’s Day and giving diamonds to mark an engagement or wedding.
The picture hasn’t been as rosy in Hong Kong, where business was stung by the fall in spending from Mainland shoppers for the first half of this year, but that has begun to pick up since July and Chow Tai Fook is seeing an upward trend. While much was made of the brand’s decision to close four stores in Hong Kong, Adrian Cheng said the big picture will reveal an overall increase in stores in Greater China in the coming year.
“We won’t be as aggressive as before, but we are going to open 100 to 150 stores in Hong Kong and China. So although we will close some, the net openings will be up,” he said.
Last year there was talk of Chow Tai Fook acquiring stakes in diamond mines to secure a long-term supply of the gems, but the potential political and economic risks as well as the issue of deploying staff mean that remains problematic.
“We always want to do something upstream, but these days it’s very hard to do due diligence. It’s not ruled out, we just haven’t found any good opportunity,” Adrian Cheng said.
Does Chow Tai Fook plan to buy any more big rocks? Why not, said Adrian Cheng, in an infectious mood after the unveiling of the super sparkly diamond necklace.
“The Cullinan Diamonds are in the crown jewels of a lot of royal families and we are now part of that family, our crown jewel becomes part of the family of crown jewels which is a kind of cross-fertilization through time and different regions,” he said.