When it’s time to buy a diamond, many people spend a lot of time educating themselves on the 4Cs of diamond quality, and then determining what the personal trade-offs between those various quality characteristics will be. Will size, or carat weight, be the main factor when purchasing? Or will it be the clarity of the stone? Diamond color almost always plays a significant role in making a diamond purchase.
While a lot of people consider diamonds as glimmering, colorless gems, some rare diamonds have magnificent color. These colored diamonds are called Fancy-Color Diamonds. Occasionally nature will get creative and produce a diamond with almost magical colors: blue, pink, deep yellows and even green hues. And sometimes man intervenes to enhance or create color. Fancy-color diamonds are highly prized, but even more so if their color is the result of natural processes
Photo courtesy of Sotheby’s Hong Kong
Early this month, Sotheby’s Hong Kong auctioned diamonds with exceptional color, some extremely rare blue and pink diamonds – an 8.01-carat, vivid blue diamond ring and a 5.03-carat, pear-shaped fancy vivid pink diamond ring. The brilliant blue diamond ring brought the second-highest per-carat price of a blue diamond. This diamond sold for $12.7 million.
The blue diamond is one of the most rare fancy diamond colors, which is why this particular stone is so special
GIA evaluates these fancy-color diamonds less for their brightness or fire and more on the diamonds’ color intensity and hue. And evaluation is key. Many diamond retailers will have a “GIA Colored Diamond Grading Report” that accompanies the diamond. If the stone doesn’t, we recommend getting the stone graded so that the buyer knows its color grade and whether the color is natural or the result of treatment.
