What to Look For
If you want to begin judging diamond quality, you must first
learn and understand the 4 C’s, which are four characteristics of diamonds that
give the gem stone it’s overall value.
The 4 C’s for judging diamond quality include the diamonds color,
clarity, carats and cut.
Judging Color
Most diamonds are considered to be ideal if they are
transparent, or colorless. Diamonds that
are rated as colorless are the most expensive of diamonds. The colors of diamonds are rated with an
alphabet grading system that starts with “D” and ends with “Z”. Completely colorless diamonds fall in the “D”
and “E” grade, while colored, fancy diamonds are at the other end of the
alphabet, at “Y” and “Z”.
There are two main ways that jewelers’ use when judging
diamond quality based on color. They may
pull out a set of reference stones, and find the closest match between the
diamond and the reference stone to determine its letter grade. Alternatively, the jeweler may use a
colorimeter, which can electronically measure the color of the stone and
determine its grade within 1/3 of a grade.
Judging Clarity
The clarity of a diamond refers to whether or not the
diamond is clear all the way through, or whether it has tiny flaws and cloudy
areas within the gemstone. It’s actually
very rare to have a diamond with absolute perfect clarity and no flaws, but
most diamond flaws are not visible to the naked eye and can only be seen with a
magnifying device.
The Gemological Institute of America (GIA) uses a
magnification of about 10x when judging diamond quality based on the
clarity. There are treatments available
to make a diamond appear nicer than it actually is, and the treatments should
lower the overall price of the diamond so it is important to do your research
before purchasing a diamond to be sure you are not spending more money than you
should.
Judging Carat Weight
Carat is the term we used to describe the weight of a
diamond gemstone. One carat is
equivalent to 200 milligrams of weight.
A single diamond with a high amount of carat weight is more expensive
than the equivalent amount of carats in multiple stones. This is because finding the larger diamonds
is much more rare of an occurrence. So
if you want a 2-carat diamond ring, for example, you may decide to go with a
half-carat diamond surrounded by smaller diamonds that add up to one and a half
carats to give you the total of 2 carats!
Judging diamond quality by the amount of carats is difficult, since
different shaped gemstones, and stones with different levels of clarity will be
priced differently even if they have the same amount of carats.
Judging Cut
One of the most important factors in judging diamond quality
is judging the cut of a diamond. It’s
important because a quality cut diamond will be more brilliant and reflects
light more beautifully, and yet the cut of a diamond has the least impact on
the overall price of the diamond.
When judging diamond quality on the cut of a diamond, look
at the stone in a well lit area. If the
light seems to go into the stone and bounce back, showing a sparkling
reflective surface, the diamond has a good cut.
The angles and shapes of a diamond are important to judging diamond
quality and the overall appearance of your diamond.
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