MAHARAJA’S PATIALA NECKLACE ….By Prishita Kharbanda

MAHARAJA’S PATIALA NECKLACE ….By Prishita Kharbanda

The Patiala necklace, was a spectacular, five tiered Art Deco diamond necklace created by The House of Cartier in 1928. This beautiful necklace was made for India’s Maharaja Of Patiala, Bhupinder Singh.

The necklace had five chains (ladi) and included a neck collar. It was platinum basecontained 2930 diamonds including the World’s Seventh-Largest Diamond, The Ligh Yellow, “De Beers” forms its centre piece at 234.65 carats. It also contained 2 Burmese Rubies and 18 carat tobacco-coloured diamond, one of the necklace’s seven large diamonds ranging from 18-73 carats. It later disappeared for a time, but was rediscovered and re-stored.

In 1998, the greatly diminished necklace resurfaced in a London Antique Shop where Cartier representative recognised and purchased it. The largest of its stones were missing including the famous De Beers. They replaced the lost diamond with cubic Zirconia and other synthetic diamonds as well as synthetic topaz, ruby, smoky quartz and citrine stones.

In 2002, Cartier displayed the necklace in its New York Boutique.