Diamonds

The four Cs of a diamond are used by gemologists to identify the value of a diamond. They are:

Colour

Diamond colour can range from the ideal blue-white to coloured diamonds of pink, green and yellow shades (known as fancy-coloured diamonds). Colour is graded from D-F (colourless) through G-J (near colourless),K-M (faint yellow), N-R (very light yellow) down to S-Z (light yellow). In the K-R range you sometimes get a very light brown called "champagne" and a darker brown called "cognac", both very attractive. Even when a stone has a visible tint, such as an M colour, it can be beautiful if it has good clarity and cut.

Carat

This refers to the actual weight of the stone in points or carats. A carat is 100 points.

Cut

Before a stone is cut, it is carefully studied to determine which shape will retain most of the original size. A brilliant cut is the most common for a diamond - other cuts such as baguette, emerald, marquis, oval and pear are also popular shapes. If cut properly a diamond reflects light back up through the centre of the stone giving out its characteristic sparkle. A poorly cut stone looks flat like a piece of glass. The quality of the cut is called the "make."

Clarity

Clarity defines the extent to which a stone is flawed. Naturally, the fewer the number of flaws, the greater the value of the stone. The term "flawless" refers to a stone that shows no flaws through a standard 10 power jeweller's loupe. A diamond's clarity ranking ranges from FL (flawless) through VVS (very, very slight imperfection), VS (very slight imperfection), SI (slight imperfection), I1 (imperfect, can be seen with the naked eye) to I3 (commercial or industrial grade).