Lowry Antiques

Diamonds - Colour

Diamonds aren't a colourless fine stone, most are nearly colourless with a slight yellow or brown tint to the stone. This is defined as the normal diamond colour range and diamonds are graded by the relative lack of colour. A diamond has 'fine colour' if there is little or no visible colour, the fewer colours in a diamond, the higher the value.

Lowry Antiques buy or sell any diamonds including diamond necklaces, diamond rings, diamond earrings, in fact any diamond jewellery or fine jewellery. Mounted diamonds under half a carat are difficult to grade and it can be difficult to see the differences in the top five or six colour grades, however staff at Lowry Antiques have expert diamond knowledge and can help grade your diamonds effectively.

In the Diamond D-Z colour range, a D colour diamond is always the most valuable diamond when clarity, carat weight and cut are consistent. Diamonds that fall outside the normal diamond colour range are referred to as fancy-coloured diamonds.

Diamonds - Clarity

A diamonds clarity refers to the amount of imperfections a diamond has. Most diamonds have internal imperfections, called inclusions and surface irregularities, referred to as blemishes, together diamond experts call these clarity characteristics. A diamond with a high clarity has relatively few imperfections and will have a greater value.

Diamond clarity characteristics, although having some negative effects on diamond value can provide some positives for diamond valuation. Diamond experts can separate diamond from lab-created diamond simulants, diamonds with inclusions are easier to differentiate than those which are flawless.

Flawless diamonds are rare and command very high prices. Diamonds with lots of inclusions or inclusions that are easily visible to the unaided eye, however are relatively cheap diamonds to buy. Between these two extremes are diamonds with inclusions that are only visible under 10x magnification, diamonds in this range make up the bulk of the diamond retail market.

Diamond - Cut

You may think of CUT as the shape and style of a polished diamond. But when we talk about CUT as a value factor, we are also talking about the proportions, symmetry and finish of a diamond, often called "make" in the diamond trade. What makes Cut so difficult to evaluate is that there is more than one way of cutting a diamond to make the most of its optical properties. A well-cut diamond, with well-balanced proportions and high polish, can make light behave in breathtaking ways. The result is a magnificent display of brilliance, dispersion and scintillation.

The three major parts of a polished diamond, top to bottom, are the crown, the girdle, and the pavilion. Some polished diamonds have a very tiny flat facet at the bottom of the pavilion, called the culet. The large flat facet on the top of a polished diamond is called the table.

The distance from the bottom of the girdle to the culet is the pavilion depth. A pavilion depth that's too shallow or too deep will allow light to escape from the side of the stone, or leak out of the bottom. A well-cut diamond will direct more light through the crown. Cutting a diamond to produce the maximum return of light depends on the interrelationship between three critical proportions - table size, crown angle and pavilion depth. These can be combined in many ways to yield equally bright round brilliant cut diamonds.

Diamond - Carat

Diamonds are weighed to in thousandths of carats and weights are rounded to the nearest hundredth or point. Some diamond weights are considered 'magic sizes' - half carat, three-quarter carat and one carat diamond weights command greater prices when buying and selling diamonds. There's probably little difference between a 0.99 carat diamond and a 1 carat diamond, however the price differences between the two can be significant.