When choosing a diamond ring, you have to consider the 4 Cs to ensure that you are buying the right quality and the right style of diamond for you. They are Cut, Carat, Colour, and Clarity.
Cut: A well cut diamond is beautiful because it's very brilliant. Of all the variables affecting the value of a diamond ring, the cut is the most crucial.
A well cut diamond is the work of a master diamond cutter, since it is the cut that enables the diamond to reflect light, creating that glitter and sparkle. When a diamond is well proportioned, light is reflected from one facet to another and dispersed through the top of the stone as rainbows of colour, making it is so exotic to look at.
Carat: The carat is actually a measurement of weight, not size. One carat is divided into 100 points. 1.00 ct is equal to .20 grams. Carat is the easiest of the 4 C's to determine.
One carat is divided into 100 "points," so that a diamond of 75 points, for example, weighs .75 carats, 50 points weighs .50 carat etc. Fine quality can be found in diamonds of all carat weights.
Colour: Diamonds are found in a range of colours - from colourless to yellowish, and judged according to a colour grading scale from "D", which is totally colourless through to "Z" which is vivid yellow.
It is the colourless diamond that is the most valued because it is the rarest. The average stone carries an I or J grading for its colour. In addition to that, there are twelve other colours called Fancies, and as the name implies, they are expensive.
Clarity: Most diamonds contain tiny natural birthmarks called inclusions and are mostly not visible to the naked eye, but can be seen with a 10X magnification.
Inclusions interfere with the dispersion of light and therefore the diamond's brilliance gets reduced. The fewer and smaller the inclusions, the rarer the stone and higher the price.
While inclusions do not generally affect the diamond's beauty and usually cannot be seen, their presence reduces the price. Clarity is graded on a scale with a range from internally flawless (IF), very small inclusions (VVS1-VVS2), very small inclusions (VS1-VS2), small inclusions (SI1-SI2) to imperfect (I1-I2-I3) with eye visible inclusions.
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