Entrants across six categories have been recognised for their “exemplary workmanship and creative integrity” by the panel of industry professionals who selected the winners to be announced on 16 October.

Interior designer Greg Natale, actress April Rose Penilly, general manager of Good Design Australia Rachel Wye and jewellery designer John Calleija made up the judging panel and were tasked with up to three shortlisting three contenders for the prizes.

The winner of each category will go on to be in the running for the Supreme Award that recognises the pinnacle of jewellery design excellence in Australia.

The winners will be announced at the Diamond Guild Australia Gala Event in Melbourne as the ceremony makes its way to Victoria for the first time. It will be the first Guild Awards since its extended hiatus after the event was postponed last year to avoid conflict with two other local design competitions.

The finalists for each category are as follows:

• Solitaire 
  Ben Preston-Black from Creations Jewellers
  Jeff Einstein from Jeff Einstein Jewellery
  Athena X Levendi from Levendi
• Fancy colour 
  Ben Preston-Black and Wisam Sarji from Creations Jewellers
  Jake Coughlan from Refraction Manufacturing Jewellers
  Jodi Penfold from Jewels of the Kimberley
• Diamonds for everyday
  Matthew Townsley from Miraj Jewellery
  Ben Preston-Black and Wisam Sarji from Creations Jewellers
  Matthew Staff from MJS Jewellery
• Diamonds for men
  Niki Jackson from J Farren-Price
  Brett Wood from Brett’s Jewellers
• Red carpet
  Rohan Milne from Rohan Jewellery
  Mike Levendi and Burt Muller from Levendi
  Olivar Musson from Musson Jewellers
• Emerging talent
  Leah Straughair from MDT Design
  Hannah Alexander from Jewels of the Kimberley
  Brock Hodgson from Stephen Dibb Jewellery

More reading

Diamond awards to move to Melbourne
Diamond Guild Awards moved to August; Opal Design Awards entries open
Diamond Awards back in 2018 after extended hiatus
 

A sudden increase in patented or proprietary cut diamonds hit the market around 2000 following the announcement of the De Beers’ Supplier of Choice program. The new initiative began linking sightholders’ ongoing supply of rough diamonds to them adding value to the consumer channel by branding and actively marketing their own products.

De Beers’ research discovered that consumer spending on diamond jewellery lagged significantly behind other luxury consumer spending so its Supplier of Choice strategy was designed to coerce diamond manufacturers to take some responsibility for promoting diamonds, rather than leaving the entire industry marketing to De Beers.

In order to continue receiving ‘rough’ from De Beers, sightholders had to market downstream to retailers and consumers. For many diamond manufacturers who had only produced generic rounds and princess stones, one way to achieve guaranteed supply was to launch and market new diamond brands and/or cuts.

The new policy resulted in an increase in registered trademarks, with manufacturers attempting to create a marketing or branding difference even if there was little or no difference in the end product to the consumer.

On the other hand, some manufacturers set out to invent new cuts as a way to create a unique product that could be protected via patents and other intellectual property rights.

However, many of these new cuts failed to gain market penetration and effectively vanished as quickly as they arrived. Only a few manufacturers have stood the test of time in this competitive segment of the diamond industry, and one is Lili Diamonds.

The company was started in 1981 by three Israeli bothers (Jacob, Itzak and Avraham) who, from the outset, identified a niche for ‘unique’ diamonds; first specialising in square shapes with the ability to supply many matching stones of the same quality for jewellery designs such as tennis bracelets.

In essence, Lili Diamonds sought to be a one-stop shop for fancy cuts, providing customers with perfect diamond layouts, designed for inlaying into rings, bracelets and necklaces.

Managing director Dotan Siman-Tov, son of Jacob, explained that his father and two uncles decided not to manufacture round diamonds and instead chose to focus on straight-edged stones.

“More than 95 per cent of diamond suppliers manufactured round stones, but you need to have something else. So we decided to go with the square shape like the cushion, emerald, asscher, the baguette and princess, and we created layouts. We hold a big stock here, and if somebody calls and says they want 50 pointers in cushion layout for a tennis bracelet, and they need to be 4.5–4.6 millimetre, FG colour and VS1, we will have the goods already here.”

According to Siman-Tov by focusing on a specific niche and holding a large inventory, a customer can source all the required stones from one supplier rather than a parcel of mixed stones from different manufacturers.

“That means our service is very quick, and it’s not something that a lot of companies have [large inventory] in the square shape. This is what I call the ‘bread and butter’ of the company,” he says.

Along the way the company began exploring proprietary cuts, and in 1996 launched its first patented diamonds – the Crisscut and Lily cut.

The company has since developed four more internationally patented stones: Crisscut Cushion, Orchidea, Wonder and the Meteor in 2010, a decagonal-shaped diamond with 10 straight walls built of 71 facets.

“The Meteor took 10 months of diligent work and persistent attempts to overcome the technical challenges and it was launched on 10/10/10,” Siman-Tov explains.

He agrees that the industry saw a sudden increase in new diamond cuts beginning around 2000, and he isn’t surprised that many were not successful.

“There are several other successful patent diamonds other than Lili Diamonds around the world, but many suppliers found that it’s one thing to invent it [a new cut] and another thing to market it and that’s not easy. There is a story to build for each stone.

“So for us it’s important that when we polish the stone, it has to be different. I mean, okay it’s unique; nobody else has it. It has different facets but the brilliance and the fire that the stone has still needs to be 100 per cent, because otherwise, for us if the stone doesn’t have – what we call in the language of manufacturers ‘life’ – then it’s not something that we believe that somebody can sell.”

The investment needed to ensure the success of patented stones is not just in the marketing; the real costs start with the initial design and development, which can take years.

While Lili Diamonds has six worldwide diamond patents, the company has at least 20 other designs that Siman-Tov describes as being ‘in the safe’ because “we are waiting for the right client to match the design or we are not so satisfied with them.

“If I look over, say, 20 years ago when we started creating patented stones, the effort and the money that you need to put into marketing and pushing these brands is a great deal; a lot! And some people want to see the results very quickly, and it’s not something that you see quickly. At least you need to be with the stone [marketing] for five, six or seven years. They try to build a reputation for the stone,” he says.

The major problem that many suppliers discovered was that the investment in the new cut would take some time to design and develop, but at that point, it’s just another stone. Once the new cut was completed, the marketing had to begin, and that was another cost.

In the flurry of activity to get new diamond cuts to market in order to appease De Beers, many manufacturers encountered another problem: the new cuts were effectively the shape of a round stone with some changes to the facets.

“When a consumer looked at a ring [with a patented cut] it looked like a round stone. The new cuts were not dramatically different to the average consumer, whereas our cuts are different because, for example, we have the Lily Cut and Orchidea that are like flower shapes and the Crisscut and the Crisscut Cushion are different facets than, let’s say, the regular emerald or regular cushion.”

Simply increasing the number of facets on a cut did not make it discernibly different to the average consumer: “So if you give one of our cuts to somebody that is not professional and you show them the stones, it would immediately be noticeable that it’s not a regular stone.”

This problem became apparent when the marketing of the new cuts involved a detailed explanation about why the diamond was different. If the new, patented cut had to be explained to customers, was it really that different after all?

Therefore, some of the new designs did not resonate with diamond buyers and were not successful.

Another hurdle was the large legal expense incurred by manufacturers to register worldwide patents and trademarks in order to protect their intellectual property.

IP protection is not a cheap proposition and holds little value if not applied to all countries and territories. Some diamond manufacturers took this into account and viewed diamond patents as all too difficult.

Since the initial burst or fad of branded and patented stones a decade ago, the white diamond market has only become more competitive as the industry has faced challenge after challenge. The continuing commoditisation of product and, more recently, the increasing volume of synthetic diamonds flooding the market are some of these challenges.

However, this has only strengthened Lili Diamonds’ focus on market specialisation; its patented stones account for 60 per cent of sales and around 50 per cent of volume.

The patent division accounts for larger sales because, not only are the diamonds a higher dollar value, but because “we make them bigger sizes, 5 carat, 10-carat; regular shapes [they] almost don’t manufacture,” Siman-Tov explained.

While Lili Diamonds is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, it has offices in New York and Hong Kong. The company promotes its products heavily, attending all major jewellery trade shows including JCK Las Vegas, Hong Kong and Bangkok jewellery fairs and in Japan.

The founding brothers still work in the business, with the 71-year-old father Jacob in charge of the Tel Aviv factory that boasts around 100 staff, with Itzak and Avraham responsible for polishing and marketing.

Dotan followed in his father’s footsteps, joining the business in 2004 while his older brother Shay, started in 1997.

In an era where businesses follow fashions and fads, often jockeying for any business they can get, Lili Diamonds has remained focused on its heritage and market niche thereby building an international reputation for creativity and the more unique side of the diamond industry.

WATCH VIDEO

Many Australian retailers and exhibitors appear to be stuck in Hong Kong following the chaos of Typhoon Mangkhut that wreaked havoc on the city, knocking down cranes and destroying windows across the skyline.

As a result, the Jewellery & Gem Fair was cancelled on Sunday and reopened Monday 17 September at visitors’ discretion from 10:30am onwards; exhibitors were allowed to re-enter the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre that morning from 8:30.

Hong Kong is a city well prepared for typhoons, with a detailed warning system that alerts residents to the severity of any approaching storm so that they know how to respond. However, many residents were not prepared for the severity of Typhoon Mangkhut that battered the city with 100 m/ph wind gusts on Sunday.

The Hong Kong Observatory had labelled Mangkhut the most intense storm to hit the city since records began in 1946.

It is unclear when Australian visitors will be able to return home as the Hong Kong International Airport has been closed and flights are still severely disrupted.

AsiaWorld Expo event was cancelled on its final day on Sunday, however according to the Hong Kong Jewellery & Gem Fair website the bump out period ran on 17 September as scheduled.