About precious stones and platinum jewelry

Diamond is the hardest mineral on Earth and this,combined with its exceptional lusture and brillant fire,has made it the most highly prized gem. Pure,colorless diamond is the most popular but other varities-from yellow and brown to green,blue,pink,red, grey and black are also found,depending on the impurities present.Because of the uniform arrangement of their constituent carbon atoms,diamond crystals are well formed-usually octahedral with round edges and slightly convex faces.

Most diamonds are faceted which
brings out their natural fire

4c's FOUR CHARACTERISTICS THAT DETERMINE THE QUALITY AND VALUE OF A DIAMOND

	Colourless stone
Brilliant cut reflects as much light as possible out through front of stone

CUT
The way a diomand is cut and polished is vital.It is the precision and delicacy of the cut that dictates the maximum amount of light the diamond will refract and reflect.The better is has been cut ,the greater will be its brilliance,sparkle and fire.When a diamond is cut to good proportions,light is internally reflected from one facet to another and then dispersed through the crown,or top of the diamond. So a well cut diamond is comprised of facets with the correct angles which are perfectly placed to maximize the diamond's brilliance.

There are many shapes and sizes of diamonds

Brilliant

Marquise

Oval

Pear

Heart

Emerald

Square

COLOUR
Most diamonds look colorless but there are many subtle shade differences and the closer a diamond is to having no color the more valuable it becomes.Why does the color vary? Well in the chaos of extreme temperature and pressure that first created diamonds traces of elements such as nitrogen and boron could have been incorporated into the diamond's atomic structure. It is these traces that give a diamond its color or lack of it.Diamonds with no hint of color at all are very rare.Red,pink and blue are the most prized but virtually all colors are possible


Different colour varieties by are caused by minute traces of other minerals	Dark green colour due to exposure to radioactive radium	Yellowish Green coloured diamond	Pink-Red coloured diamond	Subtle Grey-Green coloured diamond	Pinkish-Brown coloured diamond

CLARITY
Thanks to nature every diamond is unique.Each one possesses its own individuality.This could be due to minute traces of other minerals trapped during the crystallizition process.The number,color,nature,size and position of any inclusions determine the clarity of a diamond. The fewer the inclusions,the rarer it will be graded and the more light it will reflect making it more valuable.Since it is very rare to find a diamond that has no inclusions the closer to flawless it is the greater the value.

CARAT WEIGHT
The last of the 4c's is carat weight is the simplest of its characteristices to measure.The carat is a unit of weight which derives from the carob seed.The carat is a standard metric weight of 0.2 grams or 1/142 of a standard ounce.Each carat is divided into 100 points.For eg,a quarter of a carat is 25 points,written as 0.25;a half a carat is 50 points written as 0.50 and so on.It is easy to weigh an unmounted diamond but once it is in a setting it is only possible to estimate its weight by using special gauges and formulae. Remember carat weight has no bearing on a diamond's cut,color or clarity.

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