All sorts of characters roll into South Florida with the Art Basel tide.

In this case, we are talking about a member of a persecuted minority: royalty.

Dimitri Karageorgevitc -- better known as Prince Dimitri of Yugoslavia -- has launched a line of fine jewelry. The blond, light-eyed and porcelain-skinned prince was on display at Casa Casuarina Wednesday night, along with his one-of-a-kind designs.

''My family had fantastic jewelry,'' said the prince, who for most of his 50 years has gone by the title of prince, explaining, ``We are a minority, so we are allowed to be proud.''

Being a prince must, well, open some doors.

``It's like a wonderful decor in a great play. If the play's not good, the decor won't do much.''

Another boon: No one else in the worldwide royal clan, some 1,000 strong, is in the jewelry biz, he said. So if royality is your thing, Dimitri is your man.

But title or no title, his pieces are exquisitely crafted. The prince spent 15 years appraising jewelry for Sotheby's and although some gems are so gigantic you'd think he'd dismiss them as vulgar (a word he sometimes uses), other designs are delightfully modern, such as a Maori-inspired necklace of wood, diamonds and jiggling gold.

Prince Dimitri may trade heavily on his past -- his line is called Prince Dimitri and he uses the crest of an ancestor to promote it -- but he is not particularly sentimental. He has visited few former family estates.

''I don't want to spend my time in castles that we used to own which are now in ruins because the Communists have destroyed them,'' he said. But he recently consulted roglo.com, a website to learn more about lineage.

Bingo! Yet another illustrious relation emerged: ``We discovered that we are all related to our new president, Barack Obama, through the Baron of Curry in the 13th century, from whom apparently we were all descended.''

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