eternity rings platinum

The most important of these factors is the diamond's cut; properly cutting a diamond is critical in perfecting the gleam and fire that make this jewel so acclaimed. The mistake of an inexperienced or careless diamond cutter can ruin a quality diamond, and in contrast a diamond that is of lower quality in other areas can be vastly improved by skillfully cutting the stone. Diamond cut is a term often used interchangeably with diamond shape, but this is completely inaccurate. Shape is simply the form into which the diamond is cut. The graphic below illustrates this difference, with the photographic image of the diamond representing shape and the drawings to the left of each detailing the size and positioning of the facets for an ideal cut of each shape. You can also refer to our chart depicting some of the most frequently seen problems and mistakes made in diamond cutting.

When the cut of a round diamond has been executed as ideally as possible, the diamond will display a pattern of hearts and arrows when viewed from above (arrows) or beneath (hearts).

Color is one of the more detectable features of diamonds for non-jewelers to observe, although it is impossible for even the most skilled eye to differentiate between loose diamonds fewer than two color grades apart, or three grades apart for a stone that has been set. For this reason, color is almost often denoted with a two or three grade range and gemologists are trained to determine a diamond's color grade using master sets, gems that serve as ideal examples of one color grade.

This chart provides examples of the color grades and ranges as determined by the Gemological Institute of America:

The full diamond color grading scale has a range from D to Z, but it's unlikely you'll find jewelry utilizing anything beyond K color, and our collection cuts off at H color for most items. Diamonds that rate after H color steadily decline in value, as they are far more common and have noticeable yellow or brownish tints. There are special cases, however, in which diamonds with very pronounced natural colors such as bright yellows, pinks, and blues are quite rare and often worth substantially more than many types of white diamond. The Hope diamond is one of the most famous examples of a natural blue diamond.

The next of the four Cs is clarity, which is the evaluation of a diamond's internal and external flaws. Generally speaking, flaws inside a stone are called inclusions while flaws on the surface are known as blemishes. However, for the purposes of grading, gemological labs refer to all diamond flaws as inclusions.

Clarity grades are divided into the following categories:

Carat weight, the last of the four Cs and the trait that almost anyone can spot immediately, is the unit of measure applied to diamonds and other gems. Although carats measure weight rather than size, as millimeter width of diamonds with the same weight can vary depending on the shape and cut of the diamond, this graphic gives approximations of what you can expect from round diamonds in assorted carat weights. Be sure to go by the measurement listed rather than the image alone, as your monitor display size may vary.

While searching for the right piece of diamond jewelry, you may have noticed that pricing for diamonds of comparable cut, color and clarity grades increases exponentially rather than proportionally with the carat weight of the diamond. This is because finding large, good quality diamonds is less likely than finding small diamonds suitable for jewelry, or large diamonds that need bad areas cut away to form multiple smaller gems, so the value of a gem increases as the supply of gems like it decreases.

On sites like ours offering diamond pieces with multiple stones, you may notice measurements given in "cttw", which stands for "carat total weight". This is the term used to describe multi-diamond items with the combined weight of every diamond, and the size and weight of an item like an eternity ring will vary based on the finger size. For example, a 3.00 cttw diamond eternity ring in a finger size 6 would be exactly 3 carats as this size is what we base our products on for item listing purposes. If a size other than a 6 is purchased, the actual total carat weight might be higher or lower than the average, and this difference is reflected in the item price. This helps maintain an appearance for every ring that properly resembles our item photos.