Diamond Crown

Diamond Crown was born of one family's commission to another. In 1995, for the hundredth year of the house his father had founded in Cleveland, Stanford Newman asked Carlos Fuente Sr. to compose an exceptional cigar.

The two men settled on a format nobody was then making: an entire range at a ring gauge of 54, when the thickest cigar on the market stopped at 52. The Connecticut Shade wrapper is aged five years before rolling. Sizes added since have broken that uniformity — the No. 6 rises to 64, the No. 9 drops back to 50 — but the core of the range has stayed at the original 54.

The cigar comes out of Tabacalera A. Fuente, in Santiago de los Caballeros: the same workshops as Arturo Fuente and Ashton, both of which this atlas holds. It is the Ashton arrangement made again ten years later — an American brand, Dominican tobacco and Dominican hands — and that is why the entry is filed here rather than in the United States with its parent house.

The family has widened the range since. Maximus appeared in the early 2000s under a sun-grown Ecuadorian El Bajo wrapper, likewise aged five years, in a distinctly fuller register. Julius Caeser followed in 2010, marking a hundred and thirty-five years since the birth of Julius Caeser Newman and a hundred and fifteen since his company, under an Ecuadorian Havana-seed wrapper. Diamond Crown Tampa, more recent, takes a Florida Sun Grown binder — tobacco grown in Florida, which for a Tampa house is not a mere blending detail.

Range Depth

• Diamond Crown Classic

  Wrapper Connecticut Shade, five years aged · Strength Light-Medium

  The original range, the one of the 1995 centenary and of the uniform 54 ring gauge. Connecticut Shade wrapper aged five years before rolling, Dominican binder, filler drawn from five tobaccos of the Caribbean and Central America.

  No. 2 · No. 3 · No. 4 · No. 5 · No. 7 · No. 9

• Diamond Crown Maduro

  Wrapper Connecticut Broadleaf · Strength Medium

  The same cigar under a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper, which thickens it a notch without pushing it to full. Four sizes, all carried over from the Classic numbering.

  No. 3 · No. 4 · No. 5 · No. 6

• Diamond Crown Maximus

  Wrapper Ecuadorian El Bajo, sun-grown · Strength Full

  The fuller side, out in the early 2000s. Sun-grown Ecuadorian El Bajo wrapper, aged five years, over Dominican binder and filler.

  Robusto · Toro · Double Corona · Torpedo

• Diamond Crown Julius Caeser

  Wrapper Ecuador, Havana seed · Strength Medium-Full

  Released in 2010, marking a hundred and thirty-five years since the founder's birth and a hundred and fifteen since his house. Ecuadorian Havana-seed wrapper, Dominican and Central American filler; rolled in small batches.

  Robusto · Toro · Pyramid · Hail Caeser