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Like any industry they have
their own jargon. You don't need to learn all their terms but you do need to
become familiar with the four C's of a diamond's quality.
Cut is the first and most
important C in choosing diamonds. There are two aspects that determine a
diamonds cut. The first of which is the shape of the stone. This aspect is quite
literally the geometrical shape that the artisan has chosen for the stone in
order to bring out the most of its inner beauty. The stone can be shaped into
your basic round or into fancy ones such as the oval, marquise, pear, emerald,
princess, asscher, radiant, heart or triangle.
The artisan creates facets as they shape the diamond. The facets are flat faces
that reflect light off of each other, creating the sparkle that women love,
which jewelers call brilliance. If you're lady is one who looks for brilliance,
check out the round, princess or radiant pieces.
As the artisan shapes the stone, his skill shows the quality of the gem. A truly
skilled artist will bring out the true beauty of the piece with precision and
careful crafting. The highest grade given is ideal. Next is very good then good
then fair and lastly poor. The difference in the grades translates to thousands.
Unless you are filthy rich, you can actually select a stone ranked good that
will look as beautiful as an ideal to your lady; the difference after all isn't
visible to the naked eye.
Next C is Clarity. Every diamond has imperfections. Imperfections are called
inclusions if they are within the stone and blemishes if they are on the
outside. The fewer imperfections there are in the stone, the higher its grade.
The rarest are the flawless (FL) diamonds which have no imperfections
whatsoever. Aside from flawless diamonds can be internally flawless (IF), very,
very slightly imperfect (VVS-1 or VVS-2), very slightly imperfect (VS-1 or
VS-2), Slightly Imperfect (S-1 to S-2) down to imperfect (I-1 to I-3).
To see the imperfections, you need to use a 10x loupe, a tool that your jeweler
should have ready just for this purpose. Finding a gem without any imperfections
is not only difficult, it's expensive. You can get a VS-1 and save yourself a
lot of money and still have a rock that your girl will love.
Most ladies like the pale colored diamonds, the kind they've always seen in the
movies. Lately though, thanks to Hollywood celebrities, there is a demand for
diamonds in pink, red, even blue. The real question here is: what would your
lady like? Is she a traditionalist or a non-conformist or a fashionista? That
may tell you what shade to get.
Generally speaking though, the more colorless the stone the more expensive it
will be. Gemologists grade the color by letter, the highest being D. The
differences in color of stones that are graded from D to H are barely noticeable
to the naked eye. Again, you can have major savings from getting a lower grade.
Now, they say bigger is better. In diamonds, this may not always be true. Each
diamond is weighed in a metric system called Carat - the 4th C, which is
measured by 100 points. This is the least important of the 4C's. No matter how
big a stone is if it isn't well cut, it will still be less beautiful and less
valuable than a diamond of lower carat but better crafted and more brilliant.
The most popular is still the one carat diamond. After all, not everybody needs
to have a ring like Catherine Zeta-Jones' 10 carat gem :-)
About the Author: Lesley-Ann Graham runs
WeddingTrix.com - a valuable
wedding planning resource with articles, tips and
advice to help you plan your perfect wedding!
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