The past few years have seen a marked increase in the popularity and demand for manmade diamond jewelry. A plethora of information on the various aspects of diamonds-manmade or natural-is made available to the general public nowadays. This has helped people tremendously in making an informed decision about their diamond purchase. Many choose to go with lab created diamonds owing to their lower price and ethical sourcing while a huge majority opt for natural mined diamonds due to their rarity and uniqueness.
Mining Natural Diamonds
Natural diamonds are formed miles beneath the earth’s surface, taking billions of years for their formation. A very small percentage of natural diamonds are brought closer to the earth’s surface through volcanic activity. Such diamond ores are mined from deep down the earth’s surface layer using specialized drilling equipment. The ores thus collected are then transported to a facility where they are broken down into smaller pieces, making it easier to isolate rough diamonds from the debris.
Classifying Rough Diamonds
Specific processes are used to filter out diamonds from the ore, leaving the remaining elements to be discarded. The resultant collection of natural rough diamonds is far from being suitable to be used in jewelry. These diamonds are further classified based on a number of criteria such as their color, weight, size and so on. The sorting is done manually by people trained to identify such multiple criteria used in initial classification. Once sorted, the diamonds are labeled into thousands of different categories to be further processed.
Getting The Diamonds Ready
Larger diamonds are retained in size as much as possible to help fetch a greater value. The remaining part of the diamond is then cut into smaller ones of appropriate size and cut. The stones are then cut, the facets made, and polished to make them ready to be used in jewelry or to be sold as loose diamonds. Some diamonds are retained as they are in their rough shape. Such uncut diamonds are also in demand to be used in specialized jewelry. The cut and polished diamonds are then graded using specific criteria and are sent to be valued at wholesale markets. Most jewelers source their natural diamonds from such wholesale merchants at a bulk value.
As opposed to lab grown diamonds, the mining and processing of natural diamonds involve heavy machinery and manpower along with a lot of practices that are hazardous to the environment. This makes the purchase of ethically sourced lab grown diamonds a better option for those who care about the origin of their diamonds.