A necklace set with 35 green jadeite (a more valuable form of jade) beads and 7.7 carats of white diamonds sold for $2.3 million at Sotheby’s Hong Kong’s Important Jewels auction. The auction realized a total of $18.1 million.
The necklace, a matinee-length (21 inches) piece made and signed by Jacob & Co., is set with “slightly graduated jadeite beads of highly translucent green color, with a baguette and brilliant-cut diamond-set clasp, mounted in 18 karat white gold,” according to the report. The Hong Kong Jade & Stone Laboratory certified the jadeites as natural, a grade known in the trade as “A Jade”.
In 2014, a jadeite bead necklace sold for $27.4 at Sotheby’s. The piece belonged to Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton and set a world-record for any jadeite item ever sold.
