Diamond Grading and Gemological Reports

There are a range of gemological institutes that assess diamonds and issue Diamond Gemological Reports, as well as measure and certify loose diamonds and diamond jewelry. Depending on your region, there are a number of highly regarded companies including the following listed below.

HRD - Hoge Raad Voor Diamant (The Diamond High Council). The officially recognized representative of the Belgium diamond trade and industry. HRD headquarters are situated in Antwerp, World Diamond Center.

GIA -Gemological Institute of America. Founded in 1931 in Los Angeles, the GIA formed and introduced the international grading system. Headquarters are still situated in Los Angeles.

IGI - International Gemological Institute. The oldest institute of its kind in Antwerp. Set up in 1975 with labs in New York, Bangkok, Mumbai and Tokyo.

GemScan - GemScan International was included in 1985 as an autonomous jewelry appraisal laboratory if gem identification. GemScan is based in Toronto, Ontario Canada.

AGS - American Gem Society Founded in 1934 by Robert M. Shipley who also founded the GIA. The AGS is based in Nevada, USA.

EGL - European Gemological Laboratory. EGL was initially opened in Antwerp in 1974, and now has laboratories in Antwerp, New York Los Angeles, Johannesburg, Paris, London, Israel and Seoul.

Champagne diamonds

Champagne diamonds are in nature coloured diamonds that are fashioned in a wide range of colours from light straw to rich cognac.

The 4C's of colour, cut, clarity and carat weight apply to coloured diamonds just as they do to colourless diamonds apart from the intensity of colour, not lack of it, plays a greater part in the assessment.

Argyle Diamonds created the following scale especially for champagne diamonds. The diamonds are graded on a C1-C7 colour scale. C1 and C2 symbolize light champagne, C3 and C4 medium champagne, and C5 and C6 dark champagne. The fancy cognac diamond is graded C7.

Blood Diamonds

Blood diamonds are diamonds that are concerned in horrific human rights abuses with diamond-fueled violence, child labor, and environmental destruction. Diamond-fueled violence includes diamonds illegitimately traded to fund conflict in war-torn areas, mainly in central and western Africa. The United Nations (UN) defines conflict diamonds as "...diamonds that create from areas controlled by forces or factions different to legitimate and internationally recognized governments, and are used to fund military action in opposition to those governments, or in contravention of the decisions of the Security Council." This narrow definition does not comprise state sanctioned violence, local brutality in diamond mining, or any other human rights abuses.

Red Diamonds

Red diamonds are the rarest of the colored diamond set, and only a handful have still conventional the grade of Fancy Red, sense that they are pure red with no altering color. Though, there live Brownish Red, Pinkish Red, and Purplish Red diamonds, but usually, these stones are uncommon, and their prices reproduce their shortage on the mark.

Red diamonds can come into view in the following hue combinations:

Fancy Red Diamond



Fancy Purplish Red


Fancy Brownish Diamond

Heart Diamonds

Heart diamonds are the eventual present for Valentine’s Day. A shining heart shaped diamond helps you to convey your love for your particular someone with elegance, stylishness and romance.

Even if they are hard to find, because of their rising popularity, retailers and manufacturers are charitable them more importance and annoying to transport them in large numbers.

These fancy-cut diamonds disclose the bow-tie shadow effect even though high quality stones show this effect plainly. They classically contain 59 facets.

When fixed in prong setting they look more wonderful than in any other jewelry set, since the beauty of the shape gets noticed simply with this setting. Typically five prongs would be necessary to grip the stone. Two prongs will grip the lobes, another two to grip the sides and a V-shaped prong holding its sharp tip.

Pink Diamonds

Pink diamonds is a type of fancy diamond and is one of the precious and rarest colored diamonds. Because of its infrequency, its price is compared to other colored and neutral diamonds.

They are obtainable in different shades of the color pink: Brownish pink, Purplish Pink, Pink Champagne, Orange Pink and a lot of more. Similar to other colored diamonds and gemstones, the color quality of pink diamonds is judged based upon the color strength and constancy across the diamond. More strong and steady it is more expensive will the diamond be. But it should also be noted that yet lighter shades of pink diamonds are pricey because of their rarity.

Engagement rings with pink diamonds have become very popular because Jenifer Lopez was known a pink diamond engagement ring. Also, these diamonds have been the preferred of many celebrities and tendency setters because they carry a unique factor into the jewelry.

They are available in a variety of styles and settings. But if the preferred design is not available with the seller, then they would always welcome a pink colored loose diamonds and a location to create a custom jewelry with this uncommon diamond. They are moreover valued when set into white gold or platinum metal, as these metals improve their beauty.

2.11 Carat Mariela2 Diamond 18Karat White Gold Engagement Ring

This visually stirring diamond engagement ring is excellence at its finest. The centerpiece of this thinly crafted ring is a dazzling round brilliant cut diamond with a weight of 1.01 carats. This outstanding diamond has clarity of Si1 with a color grade of G and is bezel set reddening into the setting. This not only firmly sets your prized possession, but also protects it through every day wear. Surrounding the center stone, on the bezel are shining round cut diamonds. The side round diamonds than continues behind the side profile of the center structure, onto the characteristic circles, and lastly down the shank. These side diamonds have a total mutual weight of 1.10 carats. The side diamonds are all very fine cut and diversity in clarity from Vs1-Vs2 with a color grade ranging from G-H. The sculptured design of this wonderful piece will bring abundance of positive comments from everyone. This unique and inspirational piece measures 10mm wide at its widest point and is complete of 18kt. white gold with an entirety metal weight of 5.24 grams.

Pink Diamond Earrings

Pink is most likely the most female color of them all so it's actually no surprise that pink diamond earrings are forever popular choice among girls.

Similar to all the other colored stones pink diamonds are always extremely high in demand, and being high in demand sense these babies will not come up to cheap in most cases, particularly if you choose to go for natural pink diamonds that are very rare, and therefore very luxurious.

Several natural pink diamonds have been established in Argyle mine in Australia, while some pink diamonds in the marker also invent from Africa and Brazil. Pink diamond rings are also fairly popular but not quite as well-liked as pink diamond earrings that are always high in insist.

Pink diamond earrings are recommended to girls that are full of self-assurance, proud of their femaleness, and not frightened to add shine of class to their daily look. With pink diamond earrings one obsession is sure, that is that you won't get ignored as they are sure to add the highlight to your face.

Conflict Diamonds

As a result of the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme, diamonds are among the most monitored and audited of any natural resource in the world. This system has proven to be an essential and effective tool in combating the scourge of conflict diamonds

The Kimberley Process was launched in 2003 to control and monitor the trade in rough diamonds. In just three years, the international community has made remarkable strides to certify the $30 billion annual international rough diamond trade by creating a documentary record of rough diamonds from mine to polishing. Rough diamonds must be shipped in sealed containers and exported with a Kimberley Process Certificate which certifies that the diamonds are conflict free.

What are the techniques to find the diamond is real or fake

Here are some techniques that are used to identify that the diamonds are fake or real one.

Transparency Test

In this transparency test, the stone is located up-side down on a paper with written something. If the characters appear to be readable then you can be sure that the diamond is fake one, as written material cannot be read means the diamond is real one.

Fog Test

Blow a little air on the stone from your mouth to fog it. If the fog lives on the stone, it means the stone is not original diamond. Heat gets detached fast on real diamonds resulting in fascinating the fog within no time.

Ultraviolet test

When a real diamond is held below ultraviolet light, it produces blue colored light. The same goes for it when held below black color. The difficulty of this technique is that along with fake diamonds, high class diamonds also do not produce the future blue colored light.

Reflection Test

A real diamond always reproduces shades of the color grey and white and does not produce rainbow reflections. These rainbow reflections can be seen from fake diamonds or real but small excellence diamonds.

Sparkles

Real diamond sparkles from all sides, no matter which point of view it is view from, whereas in fake diamonds the shine is seen from the peak only and looks dull from all the other side angles.

Diamond Rates head up again

Retail diamond values in the second half of 2008 qualified one of the main decreases in decades and followed by comparatively no price changes up or downward in 2009. Though, rough diamond rates in 2009 were up by regarding 15% and they have increased that much by now in 2010. As a result, there is major pressure on refined diamond prices to move up.

With the U.S. financial system star to recover and the U.S. consumers classically purchasing concerning half the world’s diamonds and diamond jewelry, retail rates are moving up.

By the ending of January 2010, there was an industry wide price increase for diamonds over 3.0 carat weight with price increases series from 1.5% to 3.5% depending on carat weight, color and clearness of the diamond. In middle of the February, one more industry wide price increase occurred for round diamonds in the 1.00 to 1.99 carat range with at least H color and VS2 clearness and had increases in the 1.0% to 5.0% range depending on carat weight, color, and clarity of the diamond.

It is only a material of time before we see cost increases for fancy shaped diamonds less than 3.0 carats and for round diamonds in the 2.0 to 2.99 carat weight variety.

These early year increases will not be the last increases as projections are for elegant diamond prices to increase by double-digits for 2010. For diamond consumers, this means that the top prices are leaving to be had now quite than later this year or in the predictable future.

Advice on How to Protect Jewelry

Try to keep your gold jewelry or Diamond jewelry or any other from scratches, sharp blows, insensitive chemicals, tremendous temperatures and sunlight.

Here are few advices regarding how to maintain your jewelry in good condition:

* Store jewelry disjointedly so it does not scratch to other jewelry.
* When doing home tasks such as gardening and cleaning, at that time, remove rings.
* After washing or bathing and applying any makeup or hair spray, put your jewelry.
* Never put on jewelry whereas swimming in a swimming pool. The chlorine can cause spoil to various gemstones and gold.
* Please avoid storing your jewelry after that to a heating vent, window sill or on a car's dashboard. Store your jewelry away from sunlight because the sun rays may fade your gemstones
* Don’t store your pearls in plastic bags.
* The majority jewelers will restring necklaces or rearrange stones
* Sterling silver will shine up by rubbing or polishing it with a spongy cotton cloth.
* Store silver in plastic bags with an interlocking seal to build it less flat to stain.

Black jewelry in fashion

Black could be the latest trendy fashion in this holiday season. According to fashion cognizant, wearing black clothes can build you slim and wearing black jewelry is the shiniest. And still black jewelry can suit to any occasions. You can decide fashion accessory from rings to necklaces, bracelets, pendants, rings, glitzy add-ons, the darker, and the simpler and more traditional accessories.

Going black is the leave days in style! Be ready to shine your way during the holidays? And wearing Black is the fashion in the style world!

Black bling is huge in the shape of black titanium or tungsten engagement ring with a big, fat carbonado. "Carbonado" or "black diamonds" is a luxury baubles and a hot product since their detection in Brazil.

With the new trend of black being the color of selection among several people, jewelry designers have been featuring black diamonds and black titanium as hottest trend of jewelry. Black does go with all and as it would with a fancy New Years dress!

Fluorescence

Certain diamonds produce a slight blue glow when bare to ultraviolet rays. This interesting fact is called fluorescence. Many light basis including the sun, glowing office lights, and "black" lights produce ultraviolet rays. In usual lighting situation, fluorescence cannot be seen.

EGL USA specifies the power of fluorescence on its diamond certificates for identification purposes. The look of fluorescence in diamonds exposed to strong ultraviolet lamps ranges from extremely faint (hardly perceptible) to very strong (a neon-blue burn). Some diamonds illustrate no fluorescence at all.

A scientific industry learns showed that, with little exceptions, fluorescence in diamonds involves neither price nor look. In case, diamonds with incredibly strong fluorescence and a particular arrangement of clearness characteristics may look a little "cloudy," but consumers hardly ever encounter such diamonds. Fluorescence may also have a slightly positive power on the appearance of convinced off-colored diamonds, thus making them better-looking to own

What Should You Know While Buying An Antique Diamond Ring

First of all, before you buy an antique diamond ring as a wedding rings or engagement rings, here are few of things you consider:

1. Make sure that the antique diamond ring is efficiently appraised previous to your pay for it. By doing this, you can be certain that all of its gems are genuine. You can also decide if the ring has been repaired or if it needs maintenance in case there are mineral chips or cracks.

2. Look for a snap with a seal or written and signed understanding to identify when the ring was authentic.

3. In case the antique diamond ring needs a mend, get a predictable cost of previous to proceeding.

4. Be flexible. There are gemstones and designs other citizens think as unsuccessful. If you're not into these legends, you might desire to think these antique diamond rings since they might be less luxurious than others.

5. Make sure that you examine and look at closely the state of the antique engagement ring. Get note of the prongs investment the center diamond and the stem of the ring.

6. Make some investigate on 10X jeweler's loupe.

7. Purchase the antique diamond ring from a highly regarded jeweler or Diamond jewelry store.

8. Make sure that all about the antique wedding ring is on paper on receipts, assessments, and guarantees.

9. Identify if the stone is a real diamond or if it is a cubic zirconia, moissanite or other artificial substance.

10. If possible, get an official document from Gemological Institute of America (GIA) to make sure the genuineness of your very old diamond ring.

Diamond Cut

Several people confuse diamond cut with the shape of a diamond. Unlike shape, diamond cut is the metric used to estimate the precision and value of the overall cutting itself. Diamond cut is the majority complex of the 4 Cs, and not even the major labs agree on how to best calculate the quality of a diamond’s cut. Diamond Cut typically takes into consideration 3 criteria: Proportions, Symmetry and Polish. Sometimes Light Performance or other tests can be used to also measure the precision of the diamond cut.

1. When a diamond is cut to correct size, light is reflected from one surface to another surface and then detached through the top of the stone like to the image shown to the left.

2. If the cut of the diamond is too deep, some light escapes during the opposite side of the pavilion.

3. If the cut is too thin, light escapes during the pavilion before it can be reflected.

Diamond clarity scale

All diamonds have recognizing characteristics, but most are undetectable to the naked eye. To view a diamond, experts utilize a 10x expanding loupe which permits them to see the form of tiny crystals, feathers or clouds. These usual phenomena are called inclusions. There are five categories in class that anybody interested in acquiring a diamond should be approachable of when grading clarity.

FL (Flawless) - IF (Internally Flawless)Flawless Diamonds disclose no flaws on the surface or inside are the rarest and most attractive gems.
Internally Flawless Diamonds disclose no inclusions and merely insignificant blemishes on the surface below 10 x magnifications.

VVS1 - VVS2 (Very, Very Slightly Included)Very difficult to perceive inclusions below 10x magnification. These are admirable quality diamonds.

VS1 - VS2 (Very Slightly Included)Only looking during a 10X loupe can pinpoint the inclusions in this category and are near not possible to perceive with the naked eye. These are less classy than the VVS1 or VVS2 grades.

SI1 - SI3 (Slightly Included)Diamonds with inclusions smoothly identified below 10x magnification. Finding flaws in this category with the naked eye is hard. The gems in this category preserve their truthfulness, depending on the position of the inclusions.

I1 - I3 (Included)Diamonds with inclusions which may or may not be simply seen by the naked eye. The flaws on the stones in this category will have some result on the brightness of your diamond.

Difference Between Natural Pearl & Cultured Pearl

The difference between a natural pearl and a cultured pearl used in pearl jewelry may come as a surprise to many. For an oyster/mollusk to make a pearl, an irritant must turn into lodged inside. The oyster then has a protection mechanism next to this “intruder” where it produces a substance called nacre. This nacre covers the irritant and, over time, the layers of the nacre make a pearl.

In a cultured pearl, the irritant is not obtained by some natural means. It is positioned in the oyster by man. Other than that, all is the same. The pearl still grows in the oyster the accurate same way, and a pearl is formed that is just a beautiful as some round natural pearl. The only differentiation is a serving hand lent by humans.

Kinds of Pearls

1. A culture pearl is shaped by an oyster, collected of concentric layers of a crystalline substance called nacre deposited about an irritant on purpose placed in the oyster’s body.

2. Natural pearls are formed by deposits of nacre about an irritant which by chance lodges in the body of an oyster.

3. An imitation is anything else which resembles a pearl but has a surface shaped by a manufacturing process- this is an imitation or replicated pearl and must be labeled as such.

Ideal Cut Diamond variations AGS Ideal 0 vs. GIA Excellent vs. Hearts & Arrows

In spite of all of the variety of monikers used to describe the ideal cut diamonds that we sell such as GIA Excellent, AGS Ideal 0, and Hearts & Arrows, the visual performance is mainly dictated by the proportions and the precision of craftsmanship that we insist upon and not the lab which graded the diamond nor the absence or presence of a model of hearts and arrows.


A few years before an independent gemological laboratory determined that the average light return of a round brilliant cut diamond with AGS-4 Good proportions was almost 70% while the average light return for diamond with an overall cut rating of AGS Ideal 0 was in the range of 96 – 98% depending on the accuracy of facet alignment and the mixture of crown and pavilion angle.


Most people are able to separate ideal cut diamonds from non-ideal cut counterparts from a perspective of illustration performance because the ideal cut diamonds just sparkle more. Most people however would be considerably challenged to differentiate between zero ideal cut diamonds of similar carat weight, color and clarity in spite of whether those diamonds were graded as GIA Excellent or AGS Ideal 0 and whether they exhibited a model of Hearts & Arrows or not.