Your Guide to Diamonds

What are the Four Cs?

Cut

The cut of a diamond is usually associated with its shape – such as round brilliant, princess cut, pear cut, and so on. When it comes to the Four Cs, it’s about the quality of the cut, which affects the amount of light a diamond reflects to make it sparkle. Easily the most important of the Four Cs, an accurately proportioned stone will maximise the light it reflects to make it sparkle. In the jewellery trade this is referred to as fire and brilliance. Fire is the rainbow flashes of light reflected from within the stone. Brilliance refers to the diamond’s brightness.

Colour

This refers to the lack of colour in a diamond, the lesser the colour, the higher the grade of diamond. The industry standard for colour grading is on a scale of D to Z; with D being absolutely colourless and the highest grade possible to Z having a noticeable degree of colour.

Clarity

Diamonds naturally form with surface blemishes or internal imperfections known as inclusions. The GIA (Gemological Institute of America) grades diamonds on a Clarity Grading Scale ranging from Flawless (F) to Included (I), the less blemishes and inclusions, the higher the clarity grade. In diamonds with a clarity grade of SI (Slightly Included) or better, these inclusions are generally not visible to the naked eye.

Carat

This is a measurement of the diamond’s total weight and not its size. A carat equals 1/5 of a gram. Carat does not always directly influence how big a diamond will appear. A well-cut diamond with a slightly smaller carat weight can appear larger than a higher carat diamond that is poorly cut, because it will reflect more light. There are also plenty of ways to achieve a large look if a high-carat solitaire ring is out of reach – such as a halo or cluster style ring that groups together multiple smaller stones.