Buying the Four C’s

                Buying a diamond is one of the largest and most personal purchases in your life.  It is overwhelming, and the information available can be confusing.  The most prevalent information available is about the “Four C’s”. The four c’s pertain to color, clarity, cut, and carat weight.  When sent to a lab a diamond is given a grade.  This does not mean the same thing as the grades we received in school.  A grade is a short hand notation of each one of the parameters of the “Four C’s”.  These grades serve to give a merchant a general sense of what a diamond will look like.  That being said, grades don’t give a full picture of a diamond, and there are other parameters that need to be looked at to determine how pretty a diamond is.  We will try to give you some more details to look at as you search for your diamond.  Sometimes the only way to tell the quality of a diamond is to see it in person.  We will break them down a little farther and hopefully make it easier while you purchase your diamond.

                The first C usually pertains to color, meaning the color of the diamond.  Along with clarity, color is arguably the most subjective parameter in the “Four C’s”.  We will talk about clarity later in the post, but for now we will focus on color.  Color is graded on a scale of D to Z.  “D” having the least amount of color, and “Z” having the most, before getting in to fancy color grades.  One of the most common questions I get when talking about diamond color is, “Why does it start with D?”.  The answer is simple; the color scale starts with D because the first three letters of the alphabet were already being used to describe color.  Many people found this to be confusing, so to simplify things the Gemological Institute of America developed a scale that could be easily verbalized and wouldn’t be confused with terminology that was already being used.

                The thing to remember about color is that each letter grade is a range.  Each color grade represents a range of hues that fall between two letter grades.  This means that diamonds with a G color grade and a H color grade can be very similar in hue.  It can often take more than one color grader to determine what the grade is going to be.  People see color differently.  What I see as yellow you may not, and vice versa.  Keep this in mind as you’re looking at diamonds and choose the one you find to be the prettiest. 

The second C usually pertains to cut, meaning the strength of the cut of the diamond.  Currently only applicable to round brilliant diamonds, cut is often considered to be the most important of “Four C’s”.  Cut is the combination of a few factors; cut, polish and symmetry.  Everything about the diamond is examined, how pleasing the pattern of light return is, the brilliance, and the fire.  How perfectly the facet junctions fit together, if the right amount of space is between each facet.  The percentages of each part of the diamond area are examined.  For example; If the percentage of space the table takes up is too much, it will affect the light performance and the cut grade.  Cut is very important, it may not be the most recognizable right away, but it can drastically affect the visual and price of a diamond.  One thing usually glazed over when looking at the cut of a diamond are proportions.  You will often hear the term “spread” being associated with a diamond.  The spread is how the diamond measures when looking at it with the table up.  There are charts that are easily found with internet searches that will tell you what millimeter spreads are associated with appropriate carat weights. 

                The third C we will discuss is clarity.  Clarity is what identifies how many internal characteristics are inside of a diamond.  When grading clarity there are number of factors taken in to account.  They are the size, number, location, relief and nature of the characteristics.  There are many different types of characteristics within a diamond; feathers, crystals, clouds, pinpoints, and others.  Clarity is determined with a value from F (flawless) to I₃, meaning the diamond is so included that it effects light performance and structural integrity.  Flawless means there are no internal characteristics or external characteristics visible at ten times magnification.  Internally flawless means there are no internal characteristics visible at ten times magnification, with minor surface blemishes.  VVS₁ means there are no internal characteristics visible looking through the “crown”, or top, of the diamond at ten times magnification.  The characteristics visible through the pavilion, or bottom, of the diamond area usually pin-point crystals.  VVS₂ means there are only small pin-point crystals visible through the crown of the diamond at ten times magnification.  VS₁ means there are minor inclusions that are difficult to see under ten times magnification.  VS₂ means there are minor inclusions that are somewhat easy to see under ten-times magnification.  SI₁ means there are noticeable inclusions that are easy to see under ten-times magnification.  SI₂ means the inclusions are very easy to see at ten-times magnification.  I₁ means there are obvious inclusions seen under ten-times magnification, and often times the inclusions are seen with out the help of magnification.  Although, it is important to note that in some SI graded diamonds there will be eye visible inclusions. 

                Clarity is often the most difficult to tell.  Everyone wants to get the best, but it is important to remember that after buying a diamond, the likely hood of you looking under a microscope at your diamond is rare.  The most important thing when looking at clarity is whether or not you are able to see inclusions with out the aid of magnification.  Often, clarity is the characteristic most easy to sacrifice to get a larger, or more colorless diamond. 

                The fourth C we will discuss is carat.   Carat is a unit of weight measurement.  It is important to understand that each diamond will carry its weight differently, which will affect the spread differently.  The spread is how large a diamond appears.  Some diamonds will have more weight in the crown, making it look bigger, and others will have more weight in the pavilion, making it look smaller.  There are readily available charts that will tell you what the millimeter size of a diamond should be for its carat weight.  This will make it less likely that you get a diamond that looks smaller than its carat weight implies.