Breakfast at Tiffany’s… via Namibia

Text and photos by ©Sharri Whiting De Masi – All photographs copyright of the author 

Re-printed with permission of the author

In 1837, when Charles Lewis Tiffany and John B Young opened their ‘fancy goods’ shop in New York, diamonds had not yet been discovered in Namibia  

By the time the first European settlers arrived in 1884, the distinctive Tiffany Blue Box had become the symbol of luxury, and in 1887 the company purchased a fabulous diamond necklace during the sale of the crown jewels of France. Not long after diamonds were discovered in South Africa, Tiffany bought the 287-carat Tiffany Yellow Diamond, reputed to have been found at Kimberley.

In 1908, diamonds were discovered in Namibia, then a German colony, Deutsch Südwest-Afrika. Today the old diamond town of Kolmanskop near Lüderitz, once the centre of the industry, is an open-air museum that reveals what life was like during those heady days in the early 20^th century. The Sperrgebiet (forbidden diamond area), and Elizabeth Bay, the mineworkers’ town, are now open for guided tours.

And, thanks to its demanding standards (and a little help from Audrey Hepburn), the Tiffany reputation for selling only the finest diamonds is borne out when brides-to-be open that little blue box to find a Tiffany diamond ring nestling inside.

By choosing Katutura as the site of the new plant, Laurelton-Reign has brought the workplace to the workers, and invested in an area of Windhoek that will benefit greatly from economic development projects

Since Namibia is known around the world for gem-quality diamonds, it’s only natural that Tiffany would look to Namibia for stones.  In 2010, Laurelton Diamonds, a division of Tiffany & Co, joined Namibia Reign Investments to open a new cutting and polishing plant in Katutura, Windhoek, allowing the company to increase the number of its employees in Namibia to about 150.

According to Tiffany & Co, the Laurelton-Reign plant meets Tiffany’s goals ‘to ensure the integrity of our supply chain’ by procuring rough diamonds around the world to cut, polish and supply finished stones to Tiffany. According to the company, “Our worldwide facilities are equipped with custom-designed, state-of-the-art apparatus and our employee-development and training programmes are designed to equip the local workforce to meet Tiffany’s exacting quality standards.”

In addition, through controlling the source, Tiffany can ensure that all the diamonds it uses to create some of the world’s most distinctive jewellery are mined according to the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS), an international cooperative monitoring system created to eliminate the flow of ‘conflict diamonds’  – rough diamonds that are smuggled by rebel movements to finance wars against legitimate governments.

The UN-mandated Kimberley Process requires that participating countries such as Namibia control the import and export of rough diamonds tightly and establish control systems over private sectors trading in rough diamonds. Rough diamonds may move among participating countries only in sealed containers with accompanying documentation evidencing that the diamonds are conflict-free. Today more than 95% of the world’s diamonds come from Kimberley Process sources.

By choosing Katutura as the site of the new plant, Laurelton-Reign has brought the workplace to the workers, and invested in an area of the capital city that will benefit greatly from economic development projects.

With a group of Namibian-based ‘sight holders’, those companies that are authorised to purchase rough diamonds in bulk in the local market, it’s also possible for licensed local jewellers to obtain Namibian diamonds more easily.  Consumers may purchase Namibian diamond jewellery from a variety of licensed Namibian jewellers, many of them trained in Germany. Items are sold with the Namibian Manufactured Fine Diamond designation. (It is illegal to buy uncut or unpolished diamonds in Namibia).

And, if you buy a diamond in a Tiffany Blue Box in New York, Rome or Tokyo, your precious stone may have come from the Namibian desert or seabed.

This article appeared in the Sept’11 edition of FLAMINGO Magazine.