What Factors Determine a Diamond's Quality?
Diamonds are held to a set of standards for Cut, Color, Clarity, and Carat– commonly referred to as the 4 Cs– to help to determine their quality.
Diamond professionals use a grading system developed by GIA in the 1950s, which established the use of these four factors to describe and classify diamonds.
The value of the diamond is based on a combination of these factors, rarity being one. Diamonds with certain qualities are more rare and more valuable than diamonds that lack them.
But there’s no right answer to how a diamond should look and better a diamond with a flaw then a pebble
What Factors Determine a Diamond’s Quality?
No two diamonds are exactly alike. Like snowflakes, each has its own set of unique characteristics, but still all polished diamonds are valuable.
Diamonds are held to a set of standards for Cut, Color, Clarity, and Carat– commonly referred to as the 4 Cs– to help to determine their quality. Diamond professionals use a grading system developed by GIA in the 1950s, which established the use of these four factors to describe and classify diamonds. The value of the diamond is based on a combination of these factors, rarity being one. Diamonds with certain qualities are more rare and more valuable than diamonds that lack them. But there’s no right answer to how a diamond should look and better a diamond with a flaw then a pebble without.
Guide to Diamonds
What Is a Diamond Shape?
Diamond shape refers to the geometric appearance of a diamond and its physical form. Every diamond shape has its own attributes and cut specifications, which also play a large factor in the appearance of the stone. A diamond’s shape refers to the general silhouette of the stone and is not to be confused with cut, or the stone’s facet arrangement.
While round diamonds are the most popular choice, many people are also drawn to the distinctive look of fancy shaped diamonds. Fancy shaped diamonds include oval, cushion, princess, pear, emerald, marquise, asscher, radiant, and heart shaped diamonds.
What is Diamond Cut?
The most important of the 4Cs—cut—refers to how a diamond’s facets interact with light. It is determined by three factors; symmetry, proportion and polish. More than any other factor, cut determines the beauty of the stone.
If a diamond is cut poorly, it will appear dull even if it has a high color and clarity grade. If a diamond is cut well, it will reflect and refract light for maximum brightness and sparkle.
Cut is the only one of the 4Cs that is affected by human hands. Two diamonds may have the same clarity, color and carat weight, but cut is what determines whether or not one is superior to the other. GIA has created a cut scale ranging from Excellent (ideal) to poor.
What is Diamond Color?
Color refers to the natural tint inherent in white diamonds. it’s very rare to find a diamond that doesn’t have any color at all, in fact, diamonds are found in almost any naturally occurring color, including gray, white, yellow, green, brown, and pink.
Color is the second most important of the 4Cs because the color grade directly affects the stone’s appearance. The color of a white diamond is ranging from D to Z, where D is completely colorless and Z is light yellow or brown. Nothing says that D is better or more beautiful than Z, D is just the most rare one and therefore the most valuable. But with the human eye, anything above H will appear colorless to the naked eye while set in a ring.
What is Diamond Clarity?
Diamond clarity is a measure of the purity and rarity of the stone, graded by the visibility of these characteristics under 10-power magnification. Surface flaws are called blemishes, while internal defects are known as inclusions. All diamonds are unique, they are made underground through enormous pressure and heat and natural inclusions and blemishes are inevitable. The imperfections created by nature is one element which enables you to distinguish it from a synthetic counterpart.
There are 11 clarity grades in the GIA clarity grading system. They are Flawless, Internally Flawless, two categories of Very, Very Slightly Included, two categories of Slightly Included, and three categories of Included. The effect of a clarity characteristic on the clarity grade is based on its size, number, position, nature, and color or relief.
What is Diamond Carat?
Carat is a term that refers to the weight of a diamond. 1 Carat is the same as 200 milligrams. The term carat is often misunderstood and It refers to a diamond’s weight, not its size. Carat weight can appear differently across different diamond shapes and two diamonds of the same carat weight can vary in size if one is cut deeper than the other. In other words, it is important to note that carat weight does not necessarily denote size.
To save money, select a carat weight slightly below the whole and half-carat marks. For example, instead of a 2.00 carat diamond, consider buying a 1.90 carat weight. This will save a considerable amount of money, and the slight difference will never be noticed. Also, fancy shapes cost less per carat.
What is Fancy Color Diamonds?
Only one in every 10,000 diamonds possesses natural color and is referred to as a colored diamond. Fancy colored diamonds come in almost any colour; red, green, purple and orange are generally the rarest, followed by pink and blue. Yellows and browns are the most common fancy colours. The value of fancy coloured diamonds generally increases with the strength and purity of the color.
The fancy color grading system doesn’t utilize a number or letter for color representation. GIA describes color in terms of hue, tone and saturation. Hue refers to the diamond’s characteristic color, tone refers to the color’s relative lightness or darkness and saturation refers the color’s depth or strength.
The strength of the color is defined by its level of intensity. We classify fancy color diamonds as; faint, fancy light, fancy, fancy intense, fancy deep and fancy vivid. In total, GIA recognizes 27 different hues of color for grading diamonds and each of these hues represent a range of different colors. Here’s the official color wheel that GIA uses when grading fancy color diamonds.
Buy with confidence from Diamonds for Breakfast
There are a multitude of organizations issuing grading reports, applying a range of criteria, benchmarks and terminology that is usually similar, but not always exactly the same. Among grading reports most commonly used in the trade are those issued by GIA, HRD Antwerp, the International Gemmological Association (IGI), the American Gemological Society (AGS) and the European Gemological Institute (EGL) and all of our loose diamonds are certified by one of those organizations so you can be sure that you find the perfect diamond for your needs.
Diamonds for Breakfast only stocks certified quality loose diamonds that are conflict-free.
A diamond certificate or grading report provides an expert opinion on the quality of the diamond. Trained gemologists with specialized equipment measure the weight and dimensions of the diamond and the four Cs form the basis of any full diamond grading report. But they comprise only part of the information that is provided. There is also a plotted diagram of the diamonds clarity characteristics and a graphic representation of the diamond’s proportions.
No two natural polished diamonds are exactly alike. While their chemical composition is essentially the same, even if they are of similar size they could have widely divergent values. What sets one apart from the other are their specific grades, and the way in which these are obtained is by submitting the stone for evaluation at a qualified grading laboratory, which will produce a grading report.
What is the Anatomy of a Diamond?
A diamond comes in many shapes and sizes but once cut and polished all diamonds possess a shared set of characteristics, often referred to as the anatomy of the diamond.
While the individual proportions, angles and placement of these characteristics vary for diamonds of different shapes, their definition is the same. The angles that these elements create determine how much light the diamond is able to reflect and how brilliant it is.
While understanding a diamond’s anatomy can be helpful, its important to understand
that every individual facet matters and a diamond’s appearance arises from the combined contribution of all its proportions. The various parts of a diamond and how well they are cut are also included as part of a diamond’s cut grade.
“GIA’s Complete Interactive Tool offers an informative and engaging educational experience to help customers learn about the 4Cs of diamond quality. Including interactive 4Cs scales, videos, and text, the Complete 4Cs Interactive Tool can be embedded directly into your website. All tools responsive and built in HTML5. Click below to explore the interactive tool.
GIA: