The King Street Emporium

Diamond Crown #5

By J.C. Newman

Stanford Newman built the original Diamond Crown in 1995 to celebrate J.C. Newman's hundredth anniversary, and he set out with a simple mandate: build the best cigar in the world regardless of cost or time. Working with Carlos Fuente Sr., he pushed every vitola in the line to a 54 ring gauge, a genuinely thick cigar for its era when coronas and lonsdales still dominated the market. The logic behind the size was practical: a wider cigar allowed the rollers to blend five distinct filler leaves into the bunch rather than two or three, adding a layer of complexity that thinner cigars couldn't accommodate. The release became a defining moment of the 1990s cigar boom and helped push the entire industry toward larger ring gauges. The wrapper is Connecticut Shade, aged five years and double fermented to deepen its Rosado color and remove any rawness, over a Dominican binder and a blend of five filler tobaccos from the Caribbean and Central America. Rated 92 by Cigar Aficionado. Multiple sizes. Medium in body. Made at Tabacalera A. Fuente in the Dominican Republic.