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 In the perfect world, the amount of love we want to pour on
somebody is matched by our financial resources, as people who are dear to us
deserve only the most expensive presents. In the world of luxury, even engagement
and wedding rings are no longer a declaration of love but an effective means to
show off and rub the new status of a woman into everybody's face. The size of
the diamond is not necessarily the key as to what makes some of these luxurious
rings so famous and recognizable, rather it seems to be a combination of the
engagement ring itself and the famous lady it is associated with.
Famous Wedding Rings
The smallest diamond engagement ring ever made
(this fact is
registered in the Guinness Book of Records) was given to Princess Mary
of
Scotland who was married by proxy to the Dauphin of France in 1518. In
keeping
with the tradition of the time, this wedding ring was very likely a
simple
golden band. Princess Mary was two years old at the time.
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen had taken the first X-ray
of his
wife's hand and that's how her wedding ring made history in the late
1890-s. Moreover,
it was probably the first published picture of a wedding ring as it was
used in
Roentgen's article Ueber eine nue Art von Strahlen (On a New Kind of
Rays) that
appeared in the Proceedings of the Wurzburg Phisico-Medical Society.
French chemist Marie caused a stir in the
scientific circles
in the XIX century by discovering iron in human blood. Inspired by his
success,
Marie decided to present his fiancée with an unusual ring made from the
iron
extracted from his own blood. However, this romantic impulsion ended
disastrously
- Marie miscalculated the amount of bloodletting and died of anemia.
The story of Princess Diana's engagement ring is no
less
tragic. Just a few days before the horrible car crash, Diana's lover
Dodi
al-Fayed bought the 16,600-euro ring from the «Dis-moi oui» (Say Yes to
Me) store
owned by Monte Carlo jeweller Alberto Repossi, which was found in his
apartment
after he died along with Diana in a car crash in a Paris underpass on
August
31, 1997.
Most Expensive Engagement Rings
Top spot in this category undoubtedly scores
Russian tennis star
Anna Kournikova with her 11-carat natural pink pear shape diamond
engagement
ring estimated at 6 million dollars presented by her fiancée Enrique
Iglesias
in 2004. However, their engagement is still on hold, and no news about
the
marriage so far.
The stunningly sexy singer/actress Beyonce Knowles
broke
many a man's heart when she secretly got married to rapper Shawn Corey
Carter
(aka Jay-Z) on April 4, 2008. Her wedding was simple but her ring was
over the
top, with $5-million worth 18-carat diamond ring designed by the famous
jeweler
Lorraine Schwartz, whose client list includes Jessica Simpson, Christina
Aguilera and Jennifer Lopez among others.
The notorious heiress Paris Hilton, even though not
a pop
star but a diva anyway, received 2 diamond engagement rings from
billionaire
Paris Latsis, a $5 million 24 carat canary diamond ring and a $2.1
million 15
carat white diamond ring.
The beautiful Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis is the
holder of
the most expensive engagement ring of the XX century, a $2.6 million
40-carat
diamond ring. After Jacqueline's death in 1994, the legendary ring was
auctioned.
Elizabeth Taylor was engaged to her third husband,
Michael
Todd, with an emerald cut diamond that weighed almost 30 carats.
However, she
is more known for her other pieces of jewelry, one more striking than
the other:
the 39 carat Krupp diamond, the 69.42 carat pear-shaped Taylor-Burton
diamond
and the 17th century heart-shaped Taj Mahal diamond.
Special Rings for Special Celebrations
Maximillan I of Austria gave the first diamond
engagement
ring on record to Mary of Burgundy in 1477. He had the ring commissioned
to
unite their two houses and make their marriage a unifying symbol to the
country.
Russian businessman Vladislav Doronin, coowner of
Capital
Group Inc., bought a set of engagement rings for the fabulous «black
pearl» of the
catwalk, Naomi Campbell in the summer of 2009. The rings are white and
pink
gold sprinkled with diamonds. However, the much awaited wedding is
postponed
due to unknown reasons.
American Beauty star Mena Suvari had her
birthstones,
amethysts and citrines in her engagement ring, when she married
cinematographer
Robert Brinkmann. The stones were set in an asymmetrical design around a
gold
band. Unfortunately the couple filed for divorce after five years of
marriage.
Wedding rings for supermodel Ivanka Trump, the
daughter of
American tycoon Donald Trump, were purchased not by the bridegroom, but
by
bride's mother Ivana Trump. She was also the designer of the platinum
12-carat
diamond ring.
Michael Douglas proposed to Catherine Zeta-Jones'
with a
10-carat antique marquise diamond engagement ring. Not to be outdone,
the
couple invited scores of A-list celebrities at their lavish million
dollar
wedding.
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