“Due to COVID related cancellations, the 2022 Bonanno award will be formally presented in 2023
at the next Tucson Gala – hopefully on 2/1/2023. – Accredited Gemologists Association”

Ceremony to take place in Tucson 2023

As the author of Photo Masters for Diamond Grading, Gary Roskin provided jewelers and appraisers with an invaluable resource for diamond grading. Former Senior Gemstone Editor for JCK Magazine (1997-2009), Gemstone Editor for the Baselworld Daily News (2010-2015), and for the Roskin Gem News Report (2009-2015), Roskin has covered the international colored gems market, as well as gemological subjects on colorless to fancy color diamonds, and the estate gemstone/jewelry market for well-over two decades.

Gary Roskin, graduate gemologist, author, journalist, and one of the world’s most highly regarded authorities in the art and science of diamond grading, is now [was] the Chief Executive Officer for the International Colored Gemstone Association, the ICA.

Roskin is a Graduate Gemologist (GIA) and Fellow of the Gemmological Association of Great Britain (FGA). In 2002, Roskin received the International Society of Appraisers’ Media Award for his feature story entitled, Bad Appraising Lands Good Jeweler in Court. Roskin was awarded several Richard T. Liddicoat Journalism Awards Honorable Mentions from the American Gem Society in 2004 and in 2011, he earned 2nd place in Gems & Gemology’s 2010 Dr. Edward J. Gübelin Most Valuable Article Award, as a co-author of Synthetic Gem Materials in the 2000s: A Decade in Review.

Roskin began his career as a fourth-generation retail jeweler in Marion, Indiana in 1976 when he traveled to Santa Monica, CA to attend GIA at the urging of his father. Upon completion of the Graduate Gemologist program, Roskin worked at the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) from 1977 to 1992. First as Assistant to the Director of the Los Angeles GIA Gem Trade Lab before moving on to resident gemology instructor in both diamond grading and colored stone / gem identification, and finally as Executive Director of the GIA Alumni Association. From 1992 through 1997, Roskin was Assistant Director of the European Gem Lab in Los Angeles. From 2009 to 2017, he taught gemology as an adjunct professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology’s Jewelry Design Department in New York City while serving as a Practical Tutor for the Gemmological Association of Great Britain (Gem-A).

During his time at GIA, Roskin worked for and with some of the great gemologists and Bonanno Award recipients including: Richard Liddicoat, Bob Crowningshield, John Koivula, Shane McClure, and Jim Shigley. Two of Gary’s former students have been honored with the Bonanno award, Chris Smith, and Robert Weldon.

Highlights of Roskin’s career include the opportunity to quality grade the Black Orlov diamond (approx. 67.5 carats Natural Black), attending and reporting on several of the Argyle Pink Diamond Tenders, and an invitation to attend the gemological study of the two blues, the Fancy Deep Greyish-Blue Hope Diamond and the Fancy Deep Blue Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond at the Smithsonian.