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When we grade diamonds today we often are asked, “Which one performs the best with light?” Of course, the simple and most honest answer is you should buy a diamond for its beauty, not because it has a set of “high” numbers. High numbers in measured or calculated performance do not necessarily equate to “beauty”. Beauty is subjective and it cannot be directly converted to a numerical grid. Of high interest to those who crunch numbers for a living are data sets which do go a long way in predicting which diamonds have the greatest hope of beauty potential. There is definite legitimacy in confirming what our eyes see while looking at data indicating we have not lost our visual faculties.
There are some shapes of diamonds which are going to be data-beauty related way more than others. The prime shapes for equating beauty to data are rounds, square princess cut, and square cushion shapes. The next category of shapes has less defined relationships to their performance data with their beauty. These secondary level shapes are marquise, oval, elongated cushion, pear, rectangular princess and heart. It is a toss up if radiant belongs in category 2 or in the next category lower. I suppose a square radiant is category 2 while a rectangular radiant is category 3. At the third level we also have the step cut stones such as emerald, Asscher, triangle, baguette, bullet, etc. Also at the third tier we have stones generally cut to look lovely in shallow or overly deep shapes such as trilliants.
When you look for diamonds in category 1 you will find a few systems and some easy to use tools which help you make good judgments over long distances. In category 2, there is some help from tools, but less data is offered by devices to prove performance in a meaningful way. In category 3, you really need to look at the diamond and compare it to others which fit your preferred budget, color, clarity and weight range.
Physical measurement can always tell you a great deal about durability, visual size in relation to the carat weight, and certain minute elements of polish and symmetry for every diamond. What data can’t relate very well, or not at all, is the beauty quotient of category 2 and 3 diamonds. Just like what you feel is a beautiful person’s face, the same applies to diamonds. We can make some very smart generalizations to head you in the right direct, but you are the final decision maker once you have the visual information plus the applicable data. I don’t believe anyone wants it otherwise, but the rush to technology sometimes makes us forget how reliable our eyes and minds are. Adding visual beauty to applicable, solid data is the right way to handle to task of which diamond to choose.
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