How to sell Buccellati Jewelry

Make sure you get the best price when you resell your Buccellati Jewelry

Rooted in Italian history and innovation, Buccellatti has long been synonymous with tradition and exceptional skill.

With designs that often flawlessly mimic Venetian lace, Etruscan patterns and the animal kingdom Buccellatti’s master techniques are meticulously guarded secrets, with few jewelers possessing the required skill to recreate them.

But tastes and circumstances change, and we don’t need to hold on to our Buccellati jewelry forever.

If you are looking to sell Buccellati jewelry and want to make sure that you get the fairest price for your piece, this blog will show you how.

The bottom line when selling your Buccellati:

The key to getting the best price when you are reselling your Buccellati jewelry is to work with someone who knows the true value of the jewelry and eliminate as many layers as possible between you and the buyer.

Auction houses, online marketplaces, etc act as middlemen and take a cut, reducing the amount they will pay you.

Our recommendation is Alon at The Diamond Oak – a fine jewelry specialist who will give you the best price possible, avoiding middlemen and fees. Get in touch with Alon here

Why Buccellati jewelry is so prized

To appreciate why Buccellati jewelry is so sought after, it pays to take a step back to explore its history. Buccellati family lore claims that the clan’s first foray into the industry was in the 18th-century, when Contardo Buccellati worked as a goldsmith in Milan.

Years later, descendant Mario Buccellati would revive the family calling when he apprenticed at the prestigious Beltrami & Beltrami in 1903. He would soon take over the firm in 1919, changing its name to Buccellati and launching an empire.

Founder Mario Buccellati

Buccellati opened his first flagship store near La Scale Opera House in Milan. The brand soon gained a cult status with an international clientele. Italian poet Gabriele D’Annunzio would become a close personal friend, and dedicated fan, who dubbed Mario Buccellati, “The Prince of Goldsmiths’.

Storefront of the first Buccellati store

Mario Buccellati had grown up fascinated by the ornate use of gemstones and metals during the Renaissance Period, a fascination still felt as part of the brand’s unique style today.

He passed this passion on to four sons who all joined the family business, opening stores in Rome, Florence, and later New York. With the NYC store opening in 1951, Buccellati became the first Italian jeweler to inhabit a location on the prestigious Fifth Avenue.

Ornate Buccellati pieces

Following Mario Buccellati’s passing in 1966, his sons Luca and Gianmaria took co-control of the business, overseeing all designs and workshops. The brothers also pushed the company to new heights, expanding globally into Hong Kong, Japan, Monte Carlo, and Paris. Keeping it a family affair, Gianmaria’s son Andrea Buccellati, is now the current head of Buccellati, alongside his daughter Lucretzia.

Buccellati celebrated its centennial anniversary in 2019, releasing 200 hand selected pieces from their archives to form a Vintage Collection. The celebration took place at Sotheby’s Paris and featured both an auction and separate exhibition.

Ornate Buccellati necklace

The Buccellati style is instantly recognizable for its distinct blend of elements inspired by Italy’s rich history, spanning from the Roman Empire to the Renaissance. Though the brand is steeped in tradition, Buccellati continues to incorporate contemporary designs and motifs that satisfy today’s jewelry fans.

A Traforato style bracelet

Something very particular to Buccellati is a form of textural gold jewelry known as ‘traforato’.

This pierced gold technique provides a richly ornate setting for precious stones. The result of this labor-intensive process often resembles a honeycomb or a fine piece of fabric, such as lace, linen or tulle, with every part of the surface being engraved. The combined use of both silver and gold is another common choice used by Buccellati to create an even more detailed  and juxtaposed effect.

A Buccellati Compact

Compacts created by both Mario Buccellati and Gianmaria Buccellati after, are particularly desirable pieces. They both retain the same rigorous level of craftsmanship and detailed metalwork and engravings, while typically also being more affordable than their jewelry counterparts.

The Buccellati brand continues to remain synonymous with elegance and artistry. Nowadays, the brand crafts pieces to ensure that jewelry lovers of all kinds are able to experience a taste of the brand, from high jewelry pieces such as the Fall of Phaeton Ear Cuffs below, to the more attainable ones such as the Ramage Eternelle Ring, that still bear that otherworldly Buccellati craftsmanship.

Buccellati Ramage Eternelle Ring

Buccellati Fall of Phaeton Ear Cuffs

Buccellati Emerald Cuff Bracelet

What type of Buccellati jewelry can be sold?

Over its short but prolific history, Buccellati has produced a variety of types and styles of jewelry, and if you’re looking to sell your Buccellati jewelry, then that’s good news for you. No matter what piece you may own, you will be able to find an interested buyer, somewhere.

One thing to know though, is that the price you receive for your Buccellati jewelry when selling can be dependent on a couple of factors:

  • Condition
  • Provenance

Condition

All jewelry bears a history; no matter how it is cared for, if it’s worn at all, it will necessarily pick up some nicks and scratches.

Some commonly used terms to describe pre-owned jewelry are as follows:

  • mint condition
  • excellent condition
  • good condition
  • fair condition
  • poor condition

When selling to a jewelry professional, it is likely that they will be intending to sell the piece on after improving its condition. That said, the better the condition of the piece, the less work will be required of the buyer; therefore, pieces in better condition should command a higher price.

Provenance

Provenance can be defined as the history of ownership of a valued object or work of art or literature.

There are multiple reasons why it is important to be able to demonstrate the provenance of your Buccellati jewelry:

  1. It proves ownership over the piece, and that it is therefore legally yours to sell.
  2. It proves that the piece is genuine.
Buccellati maker’s mark

Buccellati gift boxes

Possessing items such as your receipt, the box, jewelry bag, and other appropriate accoutrements that were included with your Buccellati jewelry purchase will raise your buyer’s confidence in the provenance of the piece:

Buccellati Replacement Value Certificate

Buccellati Receipt

Your options whens selling your Buccellati jewelry

Once you’ve made the decision to sell, it’s understandable that you would want to get the best price possible for your Buccellati jewelry.

But it can be hard to know where to start.

In this section, we’ll look at the different options for where you can sell, and some things to take into consideration when deciding which is the best fit for you.

When selling your Buccellati jewelry, there are a few things to consider:

  • What you are selling
  • What is more important for you – price or speed of sale
  • How much you value certainty

Understanding what your Buccellati jewelry is worth

One of the first things to understand is how much your jewelry is likely to be worth when selling it.

You may have a jewelry appraisal stored away with a value attached to it, which you have used for insurance purposes. While there are a few types of appraisals, it’s likely that yours will list the price that it would cost to replace the item with a new, or equivalent, piece.

Unfortunately, the value on your appraisal isn’t the same as the amount that someone would actually be willing to buy the jewelry from you for. The reason being, that anyone who would buy it from you now, would then be looking to sell it as ‘used’ for lower than the price of a ‘new’ replacement item and still make a profit.

The amount that someone is actually willing to pay for an item is known as the ‘fair market value’.

Determining the fair market value of something can be tricky, and many people look online to try and understand how much their Buccellati jewelry might now be going for.

One of the most famous sites for high quality vintage jewelry is 1stDibs.com, which specializes in selling from professional jewelry dealers to the public.

Many jewelry lovers enjoy browsing the wares on 1stDibs and it’s not uncommon to assume that if you see a comparable piece of jewelry being sold on there, then you may be able to receive a similar price for your own piece.

Unfortunately, however, the prices on 1stDibs are not a good guide on how much you are likely to get when you sell your jewelry, as the prices advertised are the prices that a jewelry dealer is selling them for, including making a profit once 1stDibs’ fees and all their other costs have been taken out.

However, it can be useful to get a ballpark figure of how much a jeweller may be willing to pay for your item.

For example, this Pizzo Venezia Diamond Band may be listed for $10,500:

However, as with buying many vintage pieces, prices aren’t fixed and dealers are usually open to negotiation.

Underneath the ‘Purchase’ button, you can see there is a ‘make an offer’ button, which says that sellers are most likely to accept offers of 5% – 20% off the $10,500 price:

A 5% to 20% offer below the listed price is a $525 to $2,100 reduction on the original $10,500 price.

This reduces the amount that the jeweler is likely to receive for the ring to between $8,400 and $9,975

Then 1stDibs’ commission fee needs to be taken into account. This is a 15% commission fee plus a 3% processing cost, which would reduce the price that the seller actually receives to between $6,888 – $8,179.

Most jewellers will look to buy jewelry for around half of what they are sure they can sell it for, so in order for this to make sense for the dealer, it’s likely that they would aim to buy a ring like this for around half of the $6,888- $8,179 figures.

This would mean that a jeweler is likely to pay around $3,444- $4,089 for this particular bracelet.

If you have an extremely high end or one-off piece, consider an auction house.

Buccellati has produced a wide range over the company’s meteoric rise, from high jewelry pieces containing one-of-a-kind gems, to more attainable rings and necklaces.

If you are selling an extremely rare or high-end piece, then it may make sense to use an auction house, as they can result in a higher price achieved due to the competitive nature of several bidders pushing the price up.

Two of the most well-known auction houses for jewelry are Sotheby’s and Christies:

When considering whether a traditional auction house is the right choice for you, it’s important to understand that the final ‘hammer price’ you see for past sales is not the amount that the sellers actually received.

  • Sotheby’s commission for the seller is typically 10% of the final sale price
  • Christies commission for a seller is also 10% of the final sale price, with an additional 2% ‘performance commission fee’ if it goes over the agreed ‘high estimate

These high-end auction houses also charge the sellers an additional 10-15% of the final sales price, which can mean that they are less willing to bid high amounts.

The other thing to consider with auction houses is the length of time that these organisations will take to sell your item.

As the snippet from an email below shows, it can take around a month for them to assess the value of an item, and you would then have to wait for a suitable auction to be held, which could be an additional one or two months.

The other potential wait could be if you list your item and it doesn’t reach your desired price, in which case it will be passed in and returned to you. This uncertainty can put off some buyers who are more comfortable with a fixed price.

For the reasons listed above, if you are keen to sell your item reasonably quickly, high end auction houses are unlikely to be able to help.

But, if you are willing to wait, you have an item that fits their high requirements and you are happy with the commission % that the auction houses charge then they could be the best solution to get a great price if your item is subject to a bidding war that drives the price up.

Selling using online auction sites

There are two types of online auction websites that deal with high quality jewellery:

  1. Auction sites that sell to consumers e.g. 1stDibs.com
  2. Auction sites that buy from consumers e.g. worthy.com

Buccellati and Worthy.com

Worthy.com is a marketplace which works the opposite way to 1st Dibs.

Instead of connecting professional jewelry traders to customers, it connects ordinary people who are looking to sell jewelry with a network of nearly 1,000 jewelry traders who can bid on their items.

Worthy is much faster than selling through a traditional auction and it does put you in contact with a range of jewelry buyers who could bid the price of your item up, if they like it.

The cost to access these buyers is Worthy’s ‘success fee’ commission, which is only payable on the completion of the auction.

These fees are:

  • Up to $5,000 = 18%
  • 5,001 – 15,000 = 14%
  • 15,001 – 30,000 = 12%
  • 30,000 and above = 10%

Worthy can be a good option as it means that your jewelry can get out in front of as many people as possible, who will then bid against each other to increase the possible price you receive.

Buccellati and IdonowIdon’t.com

I do now I don’t operates on a similar business model to Worthy.com, but has a slew of bad reviews on Trustpilot with reports of them not paying sellers for the goods that have been sold.

As a result I would not recommend that you use their service.

Selling Buccellati direct to a jewelry dealer

The best way to get the most money for your Buccellati jewelry is to eliminate as many layers between you and the person buying it as possible.

In essence, to talk directly to the type of people who are buying through worthy.com, but without having to pay Worthy the commission and reduce the amount you make.

Our recommendation is The Diamond Oak. 

The Diamond Oak is a family run business with multiple generations in the jewelry industry, based out of the Diamond District in New York.

Best of all, working with Alon you will get a fair price extremely quickly, instead of having to wait for an auction to run its course and then pay the fees out of the sales price. Alon’s process is:

  1. Complete a form on The Diamond Oak’s website
  2. Alon will get back to you with an estimate, usually the next business day
  3. If you like the estimate, Alon will provide a pre-paid and insured shipping label
  4.  Once he’s received it, Alon will check that all looks OK, and then pay straight away.

Alon of The Diamond Oak

If you have Buccellati jewelry that you are looking to sell, Alon at The Diamond Oak will guide you through the process and ensure that you receive the very best price possible – just click through and fill out the form and he’ll get straight back to you with an offer for you to consider.

Even if you don’t end up working with him, you will receive a guide price back extremely quickly, which can then help you understand whether you are getting a better deal through other avenues.