A 14.54-carat blue diamond and a nearly identical 16-carat pink diamond could become the most expensive earrings ever auctioned when they come up for sale Tuesday.
Sotheby's plans to auction the "Apollo and Artemis Diamonds" — a fancy vivid blue stone, and a fancy intense pink stone, each named after an Ancient Greek god — separately as individual lots, at its sale in Geneva on May 16.
The auction house estimates that "The Artemis Pink" will sell for between $12.5 million and $18 million, and that "The Apollo Blue" will sell for between $38 million and $50 million. Together, the pair could fetch $68 million.
If both stones are bought by the same buyer, and each stone fetches a price within its estimated range, the diamonds would become the most expensive earrings ever sold at auction, topping the $17.6 million price of the Miroir de l'Amour earrings sold by Christie's last year.
Sotheby's said demand for colored diamonds remains strong. This spring the auction house broke the world record for the most expensive diamond ever sold at auction with the $71.2 million sale of the "Pink Star" diamond.
"In the last five to 10 years, the price seems to be escalating rapidly. And we just sold this world record stone, and that was a pink diamond. So I think it's certainly the right moment, to put it like that," said David Bennett, worldwide chairman of Sotheby's International Jewellery division. "Certainly people who own important colored diamonds are aware that the market is strong."
For more record-breaking rocks, check out CNBC's "Secret Lives of the Super Rich."