There is now a company that can turn your cremated ashes into a high quality diamond:
What do you think? Would you wear your SO’s cremated body in the form of a diamond on your finger?
Would you want your body to sparkle on someone’s ear?
I mean, I could think of worse things than being known for all eternity as “that diamond stud”.
At first I thought it was a little freaky, but then I tought:
What’s weirder, having a container full of my loved one’s ashes, burying someone and letting them get eaten by bugs, or turning them into something quite beautiful and valuable?
So now I think if I had the money (isn’t it $22k for a full carat) I would do the diamond.
Hmmm. But then you’d have to worry about someone stealing/selling/giving away “grandma”.
Well, one of the first things I thought of was… what do they do with the rest of the ashes? It says that they can make either a .24 carat or a full carat.
Also, a cremated human is more ash than you might think. A few years ago we bought a very nice jade urn for my uncle… but it was too small. The funeral home had sold us a “child-size” urn. (FWIW, this was about the same size urn you see on TV or in movies for an adult).
So, what would you do with the leftovers if you went for the smaller diamond? (It’s only $4000 instead of $22000).
“…what would you do with the leftovers if you went for the smaller diamond?”
Well, mom always made meatloaf with her leftovers.
But seriously folks…I think it is more of a symbolic gesture, and not necessarily a way to get rid of the whole stash. A small diamond using a couple thimbles full of ash would be more of a remembrance.
The rest? Well, Timothy Leary had some of his ashes sent up into space, but most people settle for strewing them in the wind off a cliff, or at sea, or someplace the dearly departed felt happiest - although I think Disneyworld would frown on that (they are more into frozen memories).
it seems to be a straight forward process, and you can have previously cremated people who are just lying around your house turned into diamonds. pets as well!
i polled some people in work about this. the major reaction was: “eeeeewwwww, creepy!”
personally i think it is a nifty idea. with the way families are spread out these days people really don’t go to cemetaries like they did way back when. also there is the accidental urn toss. so why not a diamond?!?!
“ooh, what beautiful earrings!!” “why thank you! they are my father!”
i have a necklace with a green stone, looks like an emerald, but it is not. it is compressed ash from mt. st. helen’s. of course coworkers of mine think that is a bit odd as well.
oops, i almost forgot. apparently you can get aboout 50-100 diamonds from one person. the only limit is cost. it starts at 4,000. and goes up from there per diamond.
Call me cynical, but this has scam written all over it. First, the chemistry is all wrong; diamonds, even synthetic ones, are made of carbon. Guess what happens to all the carbon in the human body when it is exposed to the heat of cremation? That’s right, it combines with oxygen and burns off as carbon dioxide, and few trace hydrocarbons. There is very little carbon in cremains (that’s what the funeral industry calls them, folks!) to make anything, let alone a diamond.
Second, how would you know that the diamond they give you was made of any cremated remains (let alone your loved one0, or just another synthetic diamond they bought with a fraction of the money you paid them?
It does take a long time & the science is not new:
“The ash is first purified in a vacuum induction furnace at about 5,400 degrees Fahrenheit (3,000 degrees Celsius). It is then placed in a press under intense pressure and heat, replicating the forces that create a natural diamond. It takes about 16 weeks.”
My dog passed away about 2 years ago. I would probably like to have a ring or something made from his ashes.
I found an advertisment for a stuffed animal with a little velvet heart with your pets ashes sewn into it. I thought that was kinda neat too.
Right now he is just in a plain ceramic urn in my bedroom. I think (if it is not a scam) that it is a good idea.