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Diamond Buying Made Easier > Diamond Color

Diamond Color



The Diamond Color Grading System was developed by GIA (Gemological Institute of America) in 1953 and is now the common international language when we talk about body color in diamonds.


GIA started off with a totally colorless diamond (D) and then found a diamond with a deep enough yellow body color (Z) that the price of these diamonds started to rise. Once they had the beginning and end of the diamond color scale they just filled in the blanks with the other grades.


GIA's diamond color grading system starts at "D" for a reason.... in 1953 the common language used to refer to diamond color was A, AA, AAA, etc. These letter grades were meaningless as one jeweler's AA diamond color grade was the next jeweler's AAA++ diamond color grade. Starting from D eliminated all of this confusion. Yellow diamonds beyond the Z color grade are referred to as fancy colored diamonds.


diamond color chart




- Important Take Away Points -
Diamond Color


#1- Diamond color grading is done in a controlled lighting environment, by a skilled grader, using a set of diamonds with known colors, and the diamond being graded is unmounted. There are some colorimeters (color grading machines) that are being used but the labs are still doing it the old school way of using people. Some gemological laboratories have been known to be lenient in their diamond color grading so diamonds can be sent to these gemological laboratories in the hopes of getting up into the next color grade.... this could reflect in a 5-6% increase in the diamond's final selling price.


#2- Many people, mostly diamond sellers, refer to a D color as being the "best" color.... there is no best color! Maybe a D color diamond is best for the diamond seller because they can charge you more for a colorless diamond! The pricing level of a colorless diamond is based on a rarity factor and not on some beauty scale. I personally like a diamond with a bit of "warmth", maybe a G, H, I, or even a J.... I've even seen some beautiful diamonds that were in the M, N, O color range.


diamond color



#3- Above, I mentioned natural fancy colored diamonds (yellow diamonds with a grade beyond "Z" or diamonds that are colors other than yellow) and there are also color enhanced diamonds, meaning that the color has been altered. It's pretty interesting, check it out.


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