I think now it's time to get your suitcase packed, fasten your seatbelt and get ready for a trip to Zimbabwe.

Thanks to a thumbs-up from the Kimberley Process, which had previously banned Zimbabwe from trading diamonds mined in the Marange fields due to concerns over reported human rights violations and smuggling, the country will soon put a stock of diamonds worth at least $1.7 billion up for sale.

The Kimberley Process decided last week to allow Zimbabwe unload the 4.5 million carats worth of diamonds extracted from the Marange fields in two supervised sales. The decision on Zimbabwe's Marange diamonds was taken at a meeting last week in Russia that included two days of intense discussion on the issue.

Zimbabwe's monitor for the Kimberley Process Abbey Chikane will be a member of the KP review mission set up to oversee the diamond sales and report on them. The mission's report will serve as a basis for future KP decisions on diamond exports from Zimbabwe.

According to Zimbabwe's Mines Minister Obert Mpofu, the nation's cabinet had agreed to start selling off the diamonds immediately. Speaking in Harare Wednesday, Mpoful noted that the government was finalizing the details of the sale, and the auction would take place "within weeks."

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Mystery and prestige are the two main characteristics of Christie's – the world's leading fine art, luxury items and jewelry auction house. Some of the world's finest diamonds and jewelry have been sold through Christie's, and it is a must-visit for any collector.

The New York branch

Christie's was branded the world's leading auction house soon after its inception, largely due to the good use it made of London's then-newfound status as a major international art trade center. 

It is widely believed that the very first Christie's auction was held on December  5, 1766;  but several Christie's historians claim founder James Christie may have held auctions as early as 1759. 

Christie's was traded on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) between 1973 and 1999, when French businessman Francois Pinault took over. Pinault, who owns one of the biggest collections of contemporary art in the world, pulled the auction house from the London Stock Exchange, believing that some transactions – especially those having to do with antiques and precious artifacts whose origins are obscure – are better left off the traders' floor. Our own diamond industry also has an air of romance and mystery to it, as the majority of companies are not traded in the stock exchange, or have public-held shares. 

Christie's auction in Hong Kong

Christie's main showroom was relocated to London's King Street in 1823 and there it remains to date. The auction house has a second salesroom in South Kensington in London, which opened in 1975 and is considered to be one of the world's busiest auction rooms.

Christie's branched out over the years and it now has 85 offices in 43 countries, including New York and Los Angeles,  Paris, Moscow, Berlin and Rome; Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Bangkok, Australia, Tel Aviv and Dubai – to name a few. and Mexico City. In 1995, Christie's became the first international auction house to exhibit works of art in China.

The top five works of art sold through Christie's

1. The Wittelsbach Diamond: the famous 35.56-carat diamond fetched a record $24.3 million in its Christie's auction. King Philip IV of Spain gifted the grayish-blue diamond to his daughter, Princess Margarita Teresa, upon her marriage to Leopold I of Austria, who was later crowned Holy Roman Emperor. The Wittelsbach Diamond was mounted on both the Austrian and  Bavarian royal crowns and until 1918, it remained the apex of the latter. 

2. Dubai jewelry sale: Christie's sold a total of $21 million worth of jewelry and art in Dubai in February of 2007, becoming the first international auction house to ever hold such a sale in the emirate.

3. The Qing Dynasty bowl: the Imperial Qing Dynasty porcelain bowl fetched a record-breaking $22,240,000 at a Christie's Hong Kong auction.

4. Bronze zodiac sculptures sale: two imperial bronze zodiac sculptures, believed to have been looted in 1860 from the Old Summer Palace of Beijing were sold for $36 million.

5. “Landscape inspired by Dufu's Poetic Sentiments": in late 2009, Chinese painter Fu Baoshi's work was sold for  $7,780,105 at a Christie's Hong Kong auction of  modern Chinese art.

With the holiday season approaching it seems that it isn’t only jewelry sales that are picking up in world markets, but also those of large and unique diamonds.

Earlier this week we reported that Petra Diamonds sold a 68 carat white Cullinan diamond for $6.28 million, and now it's Hong Kong's turn to sell a spectacular color diamond ring for $10.8 million.

A pink, chickpea-size diamond ring was sold Tuesday for a record price of HK$83.5 million ($10.8 million). The ring was sold in a public auction of antiques, art and gemstones held in Hong Kong.

The pink diamond ring

The 5-carat diamond was set by London-based jeweler Graff Diamonds, which gave it the second-highest rating for being potentially flawless.

The diamond broke the previous price fetched per carat, which was set in May when real estate tycoon Joseph Lau purchased a 7.03-carat diamond in Geneva for 10.5 million Swiss francs ($10.5 million). A carat is one-fifth a gram. 

The Graff diamond was purchased by a phone buyer whose offer topped Chinese millionaire stock-investor Liu Yiqian and his wife Wang Wei, who stopped at HK$70 million.  Christie's auction house, which hosted the auction, would not confirm whether the diamond was bought by a Chinese client.

The jewelry auction fetched HK$372 million, as 89% of the 255 lots sold.

"Some of the prices were crazy, way above what one would pay in a jewelery store," said Donald May, a Hong Kong-based gemstone dealer who attended the auction. "There's a lot of mainland Chinese buying; either they didn't know what the items are worth or they wanted them so badly that price didn't matter."

Francois Curiel, chairman of Christie's Europe and head of the company's jewelry department: "It's clear that Hong Kong has become one of the, if not the, most important fine jewellery centre for Christie's." Geneva is traditionally considered to be Christie's gems hub

"In Asia, more so than in other places, it is the quality, not the size, that matters most, more in Asia than elsewhere," he added. "The finest gems, even small ones, will fetch good prices in Asia, while Western markets favor bigger baubles."

Chinese buyers have become active consumers of diamond jewelry over the past few years. China is soon expected to take Japan's place as the world's second largest jewelry consumer.

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