Though lab diamonds have been round for many years and are consistently rising in reputation, a number of frequent misconceptions nonetheless plague the trade. The reality is, lab-grown diamonds are a inexpensive, equally stunning, and equally actual choice. However we’ll arrive at that time after addressing the completely different incorrect concepts some individuals have a tendency to carry about lab diamonds.
Widespread Misconceptions #1: Not Actual Diamonds
Initially, some individuals insist on persevering with the controversy of whether or not or not lab diamonds are actual diamonds in any respect. As a result of they’re produced in a lab, fairly than grown over hundreds of thousands of years within the earth, naysayers insist they can’t be the identical as pure diamonds.
That is merely not true. Scientifically, and in keeping with the diamond specialists at GIA, that argument has been put to relaxation. Lab-created diamonds are actual and are indiscernible from mined diamonds besides when examined by educated gemologists with particular tools. In all classes that matter, lab diamonds are equal to mined diamonds.
Carat
With regards to measurement, lab-created diamonds even have an edge over pure stones. Massive pure diamonds are very uncommon, whereas specialists can create lab diamonds of just about any measurement. It is fairly tough to get pure diamonds in bigger sizes, however you should purchase lab-created stones of equal high quality and wonder in no matter carat you want.
6.12 carat Oval Lab Diamond Signature Wrap Engagement Ring
$24,300
7 Carat Oval Diamond Rose Gold Engagement Ring
$250,000 *roughly
Reduce
The standard of a lab-grown diamond’s reduce is evaluated with the identical metrics as pure diamonds. They’re assessed with the identical standards and scale, and so they’re reduce and polished the identical approach as a mined stone.
Colour
We’ll delve extra into coloration and lab stones additional down within the article. For now, we’ll merely say that coloration will be launched in the course of the progress course of for lab diamonds, or they are often created solely colorless.
Readability
Lab diamonds type imperfections and inclusions the identical approach as pure diamonds. The truth that they nonetheless naturally develop these imperfections is a testomony to being actual diamonds. They’ve the identical “rising pains” as mined stones.
Widespread Misconceptions #2: All Lab Diamonds Are Flawless
The purpose about readability is an ideal bridge in the direction of this subsequent false impression. All lab diamonds are not flawless. Lab-created diamonds are developed with one in every of two strategies.
The primary, referred to as HPHT (Excessive Strain Excessive Temperature), could be very harking back to pure diamond creation. It makes use of excessive warmth and stress towards a carbon seed, and the carbon that subsequently varieties across the seed turns into a tough diamond. The method takes days or perhaps weeks as a substitute of hundreds of thousands of years.
The second technique is known as CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition). It is not fairly as arduous on the seed as HPHT, however it nonetheless makes use of a excessive diploma of warmth that is paired with hydrogen and methane. Over six to 12 weeks, carbon attaches itself to the seed and varieties the diamond.
All through each HPHT and CVD, a diamond develops sure imperfections and inclusions. The outcome isn’t a flawless stone, simply as pure diamonds aren’t all the time flawless. Lab-grown diamonds bear the identical marks of progress and emergence as mined stones. They’re stunning, in fact, however they’re additionally lifelike… and simply plain actual.
As a result of lab diamonds do have inclusions and imperfections to various levels, Lauren B is proud to provide our prospects SI2 diamonds and above.
Widespread Misconceptions #3: Lab Diamonds Do not Have Fluorescence
Fluorescence is a sort of glow (sometimes blue, though generally yellow, inexperienced, or purple) current in sure diamonds. Fluorescence is just seen if a stone is seen below UV mild. Whereas one of these mild often doesn’t have an effect on different features of a diamond’s look, through the years it has garnered a popularity as an undesirable high quality in a diamond.
So, what does this must do with lab-grown diamonds? There’s an ongoing concept that lab diamonds both all have some extent of fluorescence or have the next occasion of it. That is not the case, nonetheless.
Simply as some pure diamonds have fluorescence, some lab-created diamonds do as nicely. However the tightly managed creation course of permits fluorescence to be prevented if and when desired. The scientists who develop lab diamonds are specialists at what they do, and there may be nothing within the course of that irrevocably introduces fluorescence into the stones.
Buying a lab diamond does not imply you are going to find yourself with a glowing stone set into your ring. Nevertheless, at Lauren B, all of our lab-grown diamonds are fluorescence-free!
Widespread Misconceptions #4: Colour Lab Diamonds Do not Exist
Whereas colorless diamonds won’t ever exit of fashion, colourful stones are in style, too. There’s a fantastic rainbow of diamonds to select from. Sadly, some imagine that you simply solely get that selection in case you’re buying a mined diamond. The reality is, lab-created diamonds have the identical vary of colours.
In nature, diamonds choose up coloration due to the hint parts and minerals current whereas they type. Sure parts, like nitrogen, carry specific colours into the combination and have an effect on the ultimate look of the stone.
Colour is launched into lab-created stones in an an identical vogue—it simply does not take hundreds of thousands of years to get there. Scientists have unbelievable management over the colour of a lab-created diamond, and so they can manipulate its dominant coloration by introducing particular parts.
Yellow Lab Diamonds
Yellow tint comes from nitrogen, which is launched in the course of the progress course of to create yellow diamonds. Yellow is the preferred coloration selection for fancy coloration diamonds as they’re the least costly choice.
Blue Lab Diamonds
Blue diamonds are shaped with boron. Boron’s origins are loosely linked to historical oceans and are discovered abundantly on the Earth’s floor. With regards to pure diamonds, nonetheless, boron is never current within the Earth’s mantle the place the important thing elements essential for diamond creation can be found. How Boron seeps into the diamond crystal throughout formation is a whole thriller.
Due to this, pure blue diamonds are extremely uncommon thus making them wildly costly. A mean medium-toned 1 carat pure blue diamond could be priced at $200,000. As for a lab-grown blue diamond, we have now a 6 carat engagement ring in our stock for one-tenth of that worth!
6.07 carat Fancy Blue Vintage Cushion Lab Diamond Engagement Ring
$16,600
Pink Lab Diamonds
Not like blue or yellow diamonds, pink diamonds get their coloration from a defect within the diamond’s lattice crystal construction. Pink lab diamonds are made via Chemical Vapor Deposition the place they’re uncovered to radiation that modifications the everlasting construction and coloration of the diamond. The method impacts how the diamond absorbs and displays mild, giving off a pink coloration in varied intensities.
Inexperienced Lab Diamonds
Inexperienced diamonds often get their hue from radioactive chemical substances like thorium or uranium; when these radioactive supplies decay, they emit radiation that penetrates the diamond throughout formation. Extra incessantly, this materials can solely get via the floor layer of the diamond crystal, which is why pure vivid-color inexperienced diamonds are exceptionally uncommon.
The colour may come from hint parts of nitrogen, nickel, or hydrogen. Inexperienced lab diamonds aren’t as frequent as blue, yellow, or pink lab diamonds, however they do exist! Scientists merely mimic the identical radioactive course of within the lab that naturally (and barely) happens within the earth—and safely.
Purple Lab Diamonds
In nature, purple pure diamonds are the rarest fancy coloration diamond on the market, thus making them the most costly with solely 20-30 present in the whole world. The typical measurement of a pure purple diamond is ½ carat to 1 carat, and the valuation of a pure purple diamond is $1 million per carat. How purple diamonds get their coloration is a little bit of a thriller as there aren’t any hint parts in these diamonds—they’re nonetheless pure carbon. Scientists imagine that, like pink diamonds, they possess a uncommon deformation throughout their atomic construction that causes them to show purple.
Lab-created purple diamonds are extra vibrant and intense than a pure purple diamond coloration as scientists can not exactly replicate the purple hues of a mined purple diamond. Totally different from nature, within the lab, scientists introduce iron to the diamond seed to attain that purple coloration.
No Extra Misconceptions
We’re happy to supply our prospects an unique choice of lab diamonds at Lauren B. These incredible stones aren’t solely a marvel of science, however they make beautiful heart stones and jewellery. Laboratories make diamonds extra inexpensive and accessible, that means extra individuals have the chance to sport high-quality diamonds of their very own. Do not let the misinformation and misconceptions about lab-grown diamonds deter you. As quickly as you see one for your self, you will know you are the true deal!
