I thought that colored diamonds were pretty rare stones…till I looked at a flyer form a local store 9Kohls). they advertised blue diamond earrings (1/3 karat) for $149.00
Are these really diamonds? Or are they really synthetic stones?
They’re real diamonds, but they’re enhanced by treatment with heat or radiation, which produces color only on the surface. Natural blue diamonds are extremely rare. Most diamonds are actually colored - colorless diamonds are rare, and light yellow or brown is most common, but intensely colored clear gem-quality diamonds are rarest of all.
Production patterns may have something to do with it. African diamonds are generally the ice-white kind. That’s the industry’s center of production. Some mines in Australia yield colored but fewer.
There is a trend to value coloured diamonds now, it used to be that pure uncoloured was considered the best. The most common colours I recall seeing (Tiffany’s on 5th Ave. had a display counter of them) were various shades of yellow. Real colour is due to impurities in the makeup of the diamond.
Also keep in mind that diamonds are graded by the 4 c’s - Colour, Cut, Clarity, Carat.
The perfect cut is that approx 135-degree angle so that the diamond will sparkle with the best total internal reflection - changing the shape to up the total weight instead of discarding more during cutting will give a less sparkly diamond.
But - the biggest item is clarity - ranging from I2 (inclusions visible to the naked eye) through VS, VVS, etc. with even smaller and fewer inclusions. Again, sacrificing purity for weight reduces the overall value of the diamond. 1/3C means they are each about 1/6C, which if an I or SI diamond means they are still getting a good markup. IIRC, a 1-carat VVS probably goes for about $15,000 while an I2 1-carat will go for under $2,000 retail.
But remember that the whole ‘rare’ diamond thing is a scam: