Natural-color yellow Diamonds

I am interested in hearing opinions about natural-color yellow
diamonds compared to treated yellow diamonds, whether it be
irradiated or hthp, or anything else I’m not aware of. Are
color-treated diamonds considered “second class” stones? Are they in
the same category as “inclusion filled” diamonds?

All opinions welcomed!
Thanks, Linda Blumel

Orchid without opinion? Jeeeze Louise!!

O.K. here’s mine Irradiated goods are fine and available at a good
price for the most part. But for high end goods they would not be
accepted as in the same ballpark as natural. No comparison

Gassho
Karl

I am not an expert on the history of fashion in diamonds and my
opinion is colored by a fair dislike of the effect of the industry
but to my knowledge yellow diamonds were considered less valuable
until Australians started mining vast quantities of them and the
Indian cutting industry developed. This near simultaneous (and for
the diamond industry highly propitious) event resulted in a flood of
very affordable small stones, making diamond jewelry attractive to
Big Box stores like Wal-Mart and to customers who would previously
have never dreamed of owning a diamond tennis bracelet. Without the
Indian cutters, who will cut 1 and 2 point stones for pennies, and
the major American retailers the Australian diamond industry would
have probably been blocked by De Beers in much the same way De Beers
persuaded the Soviets to sell their output to them. Demand from
strata of American society for diamond fashions that would
previously have only bought one diamond in their lives… a diamond
engagement ring, forced a reevaluation of yellow diamonds (and other
shades, like brown). These diamonds are now valuable in carat and
above sizes, known, I believe, as fancies.

Of some relevance is the fact that man made diamonds (I mean real
stones made by new industrial technology, not cubic zirconia or
moissanite) currently can only economically be manufactured as
yellow stones. I understand these can be manufactured with great
clarity. How many of these stones have entered the market and are
being sold as natural de to sloppy provenance or deliberate fraud is
a guess but I do not see how this can fail to happen and happen
increasingly. I do not know what the industry will do once
manufactured colorless diamonds become affordable to create but I am
not impressed by De Beers current strategy of insisting on some
ineffable and impossible to determine metaphorical superiority for
natural stones.

Mark Defrates

Hi,

Weather they are natural or treated they have a real design value.
Being one of the colors of gold they add drama to a ring. If your
asking gemilocal questions, this is the wrong forum to ask them in.

From a setters point of view, they are no different than white
diamonds to set. From a engravers point of view they are an
interesting flourish to put into a engraving. If you want to know
more, ask a more specific questoin.

Jim

Jim Zimmerman
Alpine Custom Jewellers & Repair

Irradiated yellow diamonds have less value than natural color yellow
diamonds so in that respect they are “second class” stones, but I
suppose it depends on your marketing bent. I know that Etienne
Pierret in Maine works with lots of irradiated colored diamonds.
Personally I wouldn’t sell them (although I do sell other irradiated
stones at times), but there is definitely a market for them. However,
I also think that there are a fair number of natural color yellow
diamonds and that maybe it isn’t as necessary to sell irradiated
yellow ones as perhaps irradiated blue diamonds (since most people
will never see, no matter actually own a natural color blue diamond).

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140

You might want to visit this website for more on man
made diamonds including yellow ones

Go to the following site for some great

Shine on, you lab-made diamond
http://news.com.com/2300-11395_3-6159190-1.html?tag=ne.gall.pg

Hi, Linda - don’t you hate it when everyone just ignores your? LOL…
To touch on your question - similar thoughts have been on Orchid many
times: Natural VS synthetic, treated or enhanced. In my experience the
public mostly doesn’t want stones that are very far away from
natural. Those that know something are willing to go as far as oiled
emeralds, heat treated sapphire (due to price/availability, mostly),
but not so far as something as radical as irradiated diamonds. First
off, they look fake, mostly, and they tend to have too uniform of
color. Most naturals have that sublety and nuance that natural things
often possess. And there is admittedly a mental thing - call it
snobbery, call it “standards”, whatever you like, against having or
dealing in “synthetics” - in which class I’d put all I said above -
enhanced, etc., just for convenience. In a nutshell: I personally
don’t like them, because they look fake. More importantly, I can’t
sell them for the same reasons. I would use them if someone asked, but
everyone I know wants natural.

http://www.donivanandmaggiora.com

No, color treated diamonds are not in the same lowly class as
inclusion filled diamonds. (Sorry Yehuda) Almost all gem quality
stones, along with diamonds are treated in some way to enhance their
color. You just need to be sure that it is a permanent treatment,
whether or not it can take heat, ultrasonic cleaning, will it fade
in the sunlight, wash off with soap and water, etc… There are more
natural yellows on the market right now. Many of them coming from the
argile mines in Austrailia. They are still more expensive than the
natural ones. It probably depends on what your client wants. I have
had many clients wanting natural color stones for aurvedic (sp?)
purposes. Also, it is very important to disclose any treatment to
the client.

Paula Z
Santa Fe

Demand from strata of American society for diamond fashions that
would previously have only bought one diamond in their lives... a
diamond engagement ring, forced a reevaluation of yellow diamonds
(and other shades, like brown). These diamonds are now valuable in
carat and above sizes, known, I believe, as fancies.

1977 my G.I.A. course in diamonds valued fancy yellow diamonds at a
premium over colorless diamonds of the same clarity. I had a customer
who wanted a row of 1.5 mm yellow diamonds on each side of her center
stone and after a lot of research, synthetic diamonds from Stuller
was
the only possibility for the deep color and matching size. Customer
could not have cared less whether they were synthetic or natural,
they
looked really pretty.

Richard Hart

Personally I wouldn't sell them (although I do sell other
irradiated stones at times), but there is definitely a market for
them. However, I also think that there are a fair number of natural
color yellow diamonds and that maybe it isn't as necessary to sell
irradiated yellow ones 

OK, ignorance showing here…

Why not? Are they ugly? More to the point, do they look discernably
different from natural ones? I’m just curious-- I don’t see that
many diamonds. Unlike some recent posters, I like yellow stones. I
have noticed that irradiated sapphires tend to be garish colors
compared to natural ones (at least I think so…?) So, do irradiated
yellow diamonds jump out as “fake looking” or what?

Thanks
Noel (always wanting to know, whether I need to or not)

By the way - I have accumulated a large collection of photos of
colored diamonds, just because I want to. They are available for all
to see in my Yahoo photo album heRe:

http://new.photos.yahoo.com/@John_Donivan#page1

Many of them have the prices marked, or embedded in the file name -
not that they’re for sale, just a matter of value. Enjoy!

http://www.donivanandmaggiora.com

Hi Linda,

I’ve used both natural and irradiated in my work, and in both cases
it’s been dependent on my customers’ budget an opinion on irradiated
stones. Personally I don’t have a problem with using them. If my
design calls for sparkly yellow and I can’t afford naturals then I
would use irradiated.

You might like to check out these guys too:

http://www.newagediamonds.com They, amongst others, make the
cultured diamonds Mark Defrates talked about in his post - real
man-made diamonds. The colour of the yellow looks richer than the
irradiated I’ve seen, and you get a variation in colour too, as you
do with naturally grown. I haven’t ordered from them yet, but they’ve
been very helpful in answering all my questions and I expect to
soon… I’ve had a few customers ask about ‘ethical’ diamonds,
prompted by the recent movie staring the luscious Leonardo I expect.

The other cultured diamond suppliers I know of are
http://www.gemesis.com and http://www.apollodiamond.com

Eva
Eva Martin

Noel,

It’s convenient to think in 4 broad categories:

  1. Naturally colored diamonds, mined from the Earth, cut and
    polished with no additional treatment.

  2. Naturally mined diamonds, often of “poor” (faint yellow or brown)
    color, but subjected to irradiation to create a host of other
    colors, from pastel through vivid. Most common are yellowish greens,
    yellows from pastels through golden orange, steely colored blues and
    pinks.

  3. Naturally mined diamonds of a certain crystal type which are pale
    yellow/brown but through the HPHT (high pressure-high temperature)
    process can be relieved of their coloration to yield D-E-F colors
    worth substantially more. SUBSTANTIALLY more! This treatment can be
    very difficult to detect

  4. Diamonds grown in the lab using HPHT modified processes.
    Colorless is hard and expensive to produce, not really profitable.
    Yellows through oranges are the most commonly seen, but greens,
    blues, pinks and reds are produced as well. Separation from natural
    can be easy or very difficult.

That should raise questions without end, and I would strongly
recommend a search of the literature for more info; GIA is a good
place to start…

As far as business practices go, disclosure is mandatory. Some here
say they wouldn’t sell them, but, IMO, their snobbery is affecting
their bank account adversely. I will and do sell synthetics and
treated goods to jewelers and end users, and will eventually happily
sell to the folks that some will not sell to because they won’t
carry the goods. Sorry, I’m in business to sell things, I let the
market and my clients determine what to buy, not my pre-conceived
notions of what is “good”. The FACT is that there is a growing market
among the “new” consumer for “bling”. I didn’t create that market,
but I profitably cater to it. I didn’t create hair dye, either, but
Revlon seems to be doing okay with their brand of deception.

Gemesis just ordered 100 new HPHT machines to manufacture
diamond…somebody’s buying it. And if you turn away those
customers, they will find someone who WILL sell to them. If that
someone is ME, I guarantee that you have lost that customer forever.
So my only advice here would be to learn about these products so
that you can knowledgeably and ethically offer them to your clients,
with disclosure, of course. What THEY tell their friends is THEIR
business (see Revlon).

And I cannot keep diffusion treated synthetic (!) blue sapphire in
stock. The jewelers I sell to enjoy strong markups from it and it is
beautiful and provides a less expensive than the natural. Women get
it, men don’t, need I say more?

Wayne Emery
The Gemcutter

Are they ugly? 

Well, this is my personal taste, but I don’t think much of any
yellow stones. Some of the irradiated yellow diamonds look fine but
some of them do look “fake”. Actually anytime I see a colored diamond
that looks to have too much color to be true I usually assume they
are irradiated (if I’m not spending the time to actually examine them
properly).

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140

cultured diamonds 

I am pretty certain that this phrase has not been accepted yet by
the FTC so using it in conjunction with synthetic diamonds is both
misleading and illegal.

real man-made diamonds

Well of course they’re “real”. Everything physical around us is
“real”. However the proper name is synthetic diamonds not “real man
made diamonds”. That phrase is a deliberate attempt to mislead
consumers regarding the product. Ethics need to extend to everyone in
the industry, not just those who choose to exercise them.

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140

Why not? Are they ugly? More to the point, do they look discernably
different from natural ones? I'm just curious-- 

In a word, yes. The yellows tend to look like a burnt yellow, the
blues are just plain outrageous - neon blue. And the greens are
pretty at times, but often muddy. And they look “fake” - not the
natural pretty colors of colored diamonds. I’ve seen many, of course
I
haven’t seen each and every stone…

a natural diamond is a naturql diamond, and colour treatment is, as
far as i know acceptable and doesn’t diminish its value if flawless,
VVS, or VS. If laser treated to remove inclusions i would not
acccept it, unless for use in lesser pieces where value is on a lower
tier than other stones. I use irradiated diamonds and find the range
of colours greater and therefore more versatile in terms of what a
customer may request for a piece. I would not however misrepresent
the irradiation or other treatments, nor claim to be dumb in regards
to treatments if known.If its synthetic, that is, created-or
otherwise not mined from the earth it is not a natural diamond, the
colour of which is immaterial.

And I cannot keep diffusion treated synthetic (!) blue sapphire in
stock. The jewelers I sell to enjoy strong markups from it and it
is beautiful and provides a less expensive than the natural. Women
get it, men don't, need I say more?

I have heard of diffusion sapphire, but not diffusion treated
synthetic sapphire. Since synthetic sapphire can be produced that
imitates Ceylon sapphire in color, why would they treat synthetic by
diffusion? What is achieved by the diffusion process? Who is the
source for this material. I assume you do not cut this yourself as
diffusion is done on already faceted material.

Richard Hart

In a word, yes. The yellows tend to look like a burnt yellow, the
blues are just plain outrageous - neon blue. And the greens are
pretty at times, but often muddy. And they look "fake" - not the
natural pretty colors of colored diamonds.

I just happened to see an irradiated blue diamond yesterday on a
customer, it looked like a London blue topaz. I think it was bought
on-line, and it might have been a blue topaz. If it was a diamond, it
must not have been very well cut because it was dull looking.

Richard Hart

Well of course they're "real". Everything physical around us is
"real". However the proper name is synthetic diamonds not "real
man made diamonds". 

When my customer asks me if something is real, I ask them if they can
see it. If you can, it’s real.

After they laugh, I then ask if they mean if it is natural,
synthetic, or simulant. Wouldn’t man made diamond and synthetic
diamond convey the same for disclosure?

Richard Hart