What was the most expensive diamond ever to be purchased?

The most expensive diamond was actually purchased by a London jeweler by the name of Laurence Graff, aged 69, back in December 2008. The purchase was made at Christie's auction house in Central London and the price tag on the diamond was a staggering 16.4 million pounds – which was about $24 million USD back then! The diamond was in fact the famous Wittersblach Diamond that was used as a wedding dowry of a Spanish princess in 1664. The diamond is sky blue in color and weighs 35.56 carat, making it one of the largest cut diamonds in the entire world. The diamond was off the international market for the past 80 years until it was purchased by Graff (the previous woman who owned it chose to remain anonymous). Graff in fact intends to reshape the diamond and set it inside a piece of jewelry so he could later sell it, and he referred to the diamond he purchased as "the climax of my career". He plans to send the diamond to his most trusted polisher in New York to polish it, reshape it and get rid of all the grey inclusions. Graff means to make the diamond flawless and thus to make it worth a lot more money than what he invested. So in fact, it is very possible that this diamond will be resold for another record price sometime in the future!

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I believe that the most expensive diamond ever to be purchased was bought by Georges Marciano, who is actually the founder of the clothing company Guess. Back in 2007, Marciano bought an amazing 84.37 (!) carat white diamond for a record of $16.2 million USD. The diamond itself also broke the record as being the most brilliant-cut, top quality diamond ever to be sold at an auction. The diamond received the highest possible grading of a D-color with flawless clarity. In addition, all the certification criteria (polish, symmetry, cut, etc.) received "Excellent".

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