Brilliance in a Blue Box

A brief history of Tiffany & Co., plus the history of the famous Tiffany yellow diamond (currently on display at the Smithsonian), and Audrey Hepburn's letter to Tiffany's:

video of the Tiffany diamond on display

They're calling it the Breakfast at Tiffany's diamond, and that assumption seems to draw in even more people. NECN has video footage up of the rare yellow Tiffany diamond being installed at the Smithsonian museum in Washington, D.C., and interviews some gawkers admiring the diamond. While no one interviewed said they came because they were an Audrey Hepburn or Breakfast at Tiffany's fan, I'm sure quite a few people did end up making the trip because of that Audrey tie-in. It's funny to see how relatively small the diamond seems to be, yet it's still larger than the most famous diamond in the world, the Hope Diamond (though I guess being cursed does help you become famous, as the case is with the Hope). I've seen the Hope diamond in person and it does look a lot larger when you're face to face with it. Does anyone have plans to visit the Tiffany diamond?

See the rare yellow Tiffany diamond!

If you are in the Washington, D.C. area or plan to be between tomorrow and the end of September, you may want to make a detour to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Why? Because the enormous yellow Tiffany diamond, worn only twice in its history, will be on display! You can finally see, up close and personal -- barring the glass and security alarms -- the 128 carat gem that Audrey Hepburn was lucky enough to wear. You may remember from an earlier post that Audrey was one of two people to ever wear this priceless stone, and that it was remounted in a custom-made necklace for her publicity photos. Tiffany & Co. was kind enough to loan the diamond to the Smithsonian institute, and you can see it, along with the Hope Diamond and some other iconic gems, through September 23. For more information on the Tiffany diamond and the Smithsonian display, click here.



Also, someone was kind enough to post a short clip of Audrey talking about helping people become self-sufficient in a rare UNICEF video called Audrey Hepburn: In Her Own Words. This is a great find, and rare because a VHS copy of the video sells through the UNICEF website for $100, and the whole video is only 28 minutes long.

Audrey Hepburn and Tiffany & Co.

I was out in a familiar neighborhood today and had some time to kill, so I stopped in a tiny bookstore to browse in. As I passed the art and photography books I noticed The Audrey Hepburn Treasures prominently displayed, which made me smile. On the next shelf over, however, were two Tiffany books worth looking over.

The first, Tiffany Pearls, has been mentioned here before, and showcases Tiffany's many masterpieces involving pearls. Audrey, as Holly Golightly, is featured on the front cover and on the inside of the dust jacket. I had never looked over the book in person, and now that I have I must say that you'd either have to be an obsessive Audrey Hepburn collector or just really like pearls to buy this book. Audrey herself is hardly mentioned despite her covergirl appeal, and the pictures in the book are nothing we haven't seen before. It is a beautiful book to look over, though. (For the record, the pearl strands Audrey is wearing in the film are in fact imitation pearls used many times by Paramount Studios.)


Bejewelled by Tiffany, however, has a little more to offer. No new or interesting pictures, and still not a lot of Audrey mentions, but it does give some interesting history on the Tiffany diamond, which Audrey wore for publicity photos of Breakfast at Tiffany's. Word had it that Audrey was one of only two people to ever wear the diamond, but I could never find out who that mysterious other person was. Bejewelled was kind enough to offer more information! It turns out that a Mrs. Sheldon Whitehouse wore the Tiffany diamond a scant four years before Audrey, and Mrs. Whitehouse also wore it as a necklace, although in a different setting. The "ribbon" necklace setting was designed especially for Audrey to wear for the Breakfast at Tiffany's photos, and the necklace was dismantled shortly afterwards. The mounting for the diamond was reused with an aquamarine stone and sold, and the rest of the ribbon necklace was reworked and sold as well. So there are two lucky people out there with jewelry that only Audrey Hepburn has worn before them! I wonder where they are now.