Why Diamonds?
By: Abby Hindle, Halal Incorp
Diamonds are used for a multitude of purposes, many of them practical. Their durability, cutting ability, low reactivity, and conductivity make them ideal for many industrial uses. They are most well-known, however, for their use in jewellery. What qualities do diamonds have that make them so highly prized? Why have they considered a luxury item?
Natural gem-quality diamonds are formed far beneath the surface, around 150 to 250 km in the earth’s mantle, and carried to the surface in volcanic eruptions where they are deposited in certain types of rock. They are rare, although they are not the rarest gemstone. Gem quality diamonds, diamonds that are used in jewellery, are rarer still, accounting for around 20% of the diamonds unearthed, with the remainder going to be used in industry. They are identified nowadays by their high thermal conductivity, another trait that makes them highly useful in industry.
It is commonly believed that the best way to test if something is a real diamond is by attempting to cut glass with it, as it was believed that only diamond could cut glass, but other materials such as quartz are also capable of doing so. These gemstones are highly valuable for a variety of reasons. Among them is their innate qualities; the arrangement of atoms in a diamond is very rigid, making them strong.
This makes them durable – cutting, scratching, or breaking a diamond is not quite impossible but it is close. There is a widespread idea that the only thing that can cut a diamond is another diamond.
This is not quite true – nowadays specialised lasers can do the job. In the absence of lasers, however, diamonds are pretty much unbreakable, being the hardest known natural substance on both the Vickers and Mohs hardness scales. This makes them useful in various industrial capacities and as jewellery, especially jewellery that is worn frequently or every day and thus exposed to wear and tear, such as a wedding ring.
The expensive jewellery:
It has been used in jewellery for millennia in many different cultures. Romans believed diamonds had the power to ward off evil and this belief was carried on by Italians throughout the medieval period, who added the idea that they could encourage reconciliation. They even called them Pietra Della Reconciliazione or the stone of reconciliation. This made them attractive as part of an engagement ring, as it would encourage harmony between a husband and wife. Rubies and sapphires were considered more desirable at the time, but it was continuedly kept be used in engagement rings for the wealthy and royalty for many centuries.
The thing that caused this particular gemstone to become irrevocably associated with wedding rings was the De Beers corporation. De Beers started in the year 1888 as the consolidation of various smaller mining companies operating in Africa. They dominated the diamond mining industry for over a century; in the 20th century over 80% of the world’s rough diamonds passed through De Beers. Since then, however, that number has declined significantly.
Due to antitrust lawsuits, which De Beers settled, in the early 2000s, De Beers’ virtual monopoly of the diamond mining industry came to an end. While still operating in over 30 countries and running mining operations in Canada, Australia, Botswana, South Africa and Namibia, De Beers’ market share had gone down to as low as 38% by 2013.
De Beers were responsible for the association we have today between diamonds and commitment. In the early 20th century sales of diamonds had dropped alarmingly. The end of World War One and the American Great Depression caused people to lose interest and the money to purchase expensive jewellery. In 1938 De Beers hired the advertising firm, N. W. Ayer & Son, to create an advertising campaign to bring sales up.
They pushed the idea that diamonds symbolised commitment, creating the widely referenced slogan ‘A diamond is forever. They also popularised knowledge of the 4 C’s, the qualities that judge a diamond’s value, and originated the idea that an engagement ring should cost one month’s worth of a man’s income. The effect of this was more than they probably dared hope for. Diamonds became synonymous with engagement rings and sales of diamonds in the US rose from $23 million in 1939 to $2.1 billion by 1979.
The Four C’s
The four C’s – clarity, colour, cut, and carat – are the method by which they are graded. The higher a diamond is in these categories, the more valuable it is.
Colour
Colour grading is ranked from totally colourless (D colour), a rare trait as most diamonds that appear colourless have a slight yellow or brown colouration, very slight colour (E/F colour), which appears indetectable when a stone is set as jewellery, very slight colour (G/H colour) and slightly coloured (I, J or K colour). Colouration can affect value in different ways. The very slight yellow or brown colouration is common and discounts a diamond’s overall value, but naturally intense yellow diamonds may be priced higher. Blue or pink diamonds see a drastic increase in price due to their rarity.
The colouration comes from slight defects in the diamond allowing the diamond to become contaminated with impurities. Boron results in blue diamonds, nitrogen gives a yellow colour, and so on. The exception is diamonds with a purple, pink or the rare red colouration; this results from a distortion in the diamond’s crystal lattice.
Colour-enhanced diamonds on the other hand are always less valuable than the standard natural diamond. These are not synthetic diamonds; these are diamonds these are natural diamonds that started with a low-quality colour, for example, a slightly yellow or a faint pink, and were enhanced to bring out a more desirable colour or clarity. The reason they are less valuable is largely due to the fact the process of enhancement makes them less durable. In addition to this, the colour produced generally fades over time.
The Cut
The cut is how a gem-quality stone is created out of a rough one. It is a delicate, difficult process. The shaping and polishing of such a hard material are tricky and require skilled workmanship. The cut reflects the skill and quality of the work that went into making the diamond suitable. This is the most important of the four C’s in determining the value of a diamond; a well-cut diamond can even give the illusion of having better quality and colour than it really has.
Clarity:
A ‘clean’ diamond appears to have more of the ‘fire’ that makes diamonds so attractive. The dispersal of light is more intense. A high-clarity diamond is free from inclusions, which are flaws or cracks that create a cloudy, white appearance. Only 20% of the diamonds mined have a clarity suitable for a stone to be considered gem quality and even out of that 20% many are not ‘eye clean, meaning they still have visible inclusions. The clarity of a diamond is essential to giving it the radiance that makes it so attractive as a piece of jewellery.
Carat
A carat is an industry-specific measurement used to weigh it. One carat is equal to 200 milligrams. A diamond’s size does not necessarily correlate to a higher carat. A diamond’s cut, for example, will affect its weight and diameter. A diamond that is poorly cut may be heavy but appear smaller as it will carry its weight on the bottom.
These are diamonds which are manufactured rather than grown naturally. They are identical to natural diamonds in all their physical properties. Attempts to synthesise diamonds were ongoing throughout the 20th century but only came to fruition in the fifties. Early research used processes still in use today, CVD or chemical vapour deposition, and HPHT or high-pressure high temperature. Other methods have been found since, such as detonation synthesis, which involved detonating explosives which contain carbon to create nanometre-sized grains of diamond, however, these methods are not as common as HPHT and CVD.
Synthetic diamonds made up around 3% of the quality diamond market as of 2013. As they are physically identical, or even superior, to natural diamonds and are often priced lower, they are a good substitute for natural diamonds, allowing the buyer to avoid any ethical issues surrounding the production of natural diamonds.
The introduction of the Kimberley Process helped cut down on the amount of ‘blood diamonds’ in circulation, but two flaws in the process remain; the ease by which diamonds can be smuggled over African borders and the fact that even non-blood diamonds are often produced in ways that may fall short of a person’s ethics. Synthetic diamonds and diamond simulants are a good alternative.
Diamond simulants
These are objects with similar gemological traits to a diamond, such as light dispersion and hardness. They have the traits that make diamonds so desired but are not actually diamonds. The most common substitute materials are high-loaded glass and cubic zirconia. These are more affordable substitutes for normal diamonds that provide similar benefits.
They possess many traits that make them desirable, such as rarity, durability, and aesthetic appeal. Clever marketing and the association of diamonds with true commitment have maintained the public interest in purchasing diamonds and ensured they maintain their position as a high-value luxury item.