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 :-)
