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Diamonds

Holloway Cut Adviser – Useful Tool or Museum Piece?

August 27th, 2023

23 years ago, in 2000, Melbourne gemmologist Garry Hollway, developed the Holloway Cut Adviser, more commonly known as the HCA. Essentially this tool took the proportions of a round brilliant diamond (table, depth, crown angle and pavilion angle) and produced a rating that judged how well the diamond was cut. At the time, it was a very useful tool, as GIA hadn’t released their cut grading system, AGS Labs didn’t exist yet and void of the transparency that the internet provides, the diamond industry relied more on bogus terms such as “Belgian Ideal Cut” and “Russian Ideal Cut” to describe the cut of a diamond. However, beginning in the mid-2000s, a number of things happened that seemed to make the HCA obsolete, such as GIA introducing their cut grade, AGS Labs opening and more vendors providing detailed cut analysis online. So, is the HCA a useful tool in this day and age, or should it be consigned to a museum?

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Debunking Lab Grown Diamonds Myths and Truths

March 20th, 2023

Like a lot of jewellers nowadays, we sell lab grown diamonds. With this comes the obligatory question from customers, “What’s the difference between lab grown and natural?” The biggest difference is of course the price – a 1ct F/VS2 ideal cut natural diamond may cost $9,000, whereas a lab grown diamond of the same size and specifications may only cost $900. However, when researching this topic, most opinions are decisively favourable toward lab grown diamonds, with only a few like Martin Rapaport, coming to the defence of natural diamonds. However, delving deeper into this debate reveals that some of the claims put forward by lab grown diamond proponents may be completely false.

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Diamond Tzar on Lab Grown Diamonds: If You Want To Have Children, You Need To Buy a Natural Diamond

January 31st, 2023

In his New Year message, diamond industry tzar, Martin Rapaport, or as I like to call him, “he who must be obeyed” delivered an unfettered rant about lab grown diamonds.

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Lab Grown Diamonds. Industry Disruptor or A One Hit Wonder?

October 27th, 2021

Over the last year, I’ve noticed more and more customers bringing their own lab grown diamonds into us for us to set into a ring. Sensing a trend, we’ve recently jumped on the lab grown diamond bandwagon and started selling them ourselves. That said, there still is a lot of myths, confusion and debate amongst industry professionals and consumers alike.

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Analysis of Diamond Analysis Equipment

October 31st, 2012

For nearly six years now, we have been analysing every single certified diamond we sell above 0.30ct. This analysis is designed to be complementary to GIA or AGS lab certificates, and includes a photo of the diamond, an Ideal-Scope or AGS ASET image, OGI Firetrace output, a hearts image and a couple of videos. All of this analysis can be seen for any one of our Crossfire or Signature Series diamonds.
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Five Myths About Fancy Cut Diamonds

December 5th, 2010

A fancy cut diamond, is defined as anything other than a standard round brilliant. The most popular include: Princess Cut, Emerald Cut, Asscher Cut, Cushion Cut, Pear Shape, Oval Shape, Radiant Cut, Heart Shape and Marquise Cut. However, many diamond buyers are still confused, especially when it comes to the cut quality of fancy shapes, as to what they should buy.
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The Evolution of Diamond Cut Grading

December 2nd, 2010

Just like mobile phones have evolved over the past three decades, diamond cut grading has as well. Over the years, we’ve gone from assigning a cut grade by measuring a diamond’s table and depth to using advanced ray-tracing techniques to assign cut grades.
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Diamond Transparency and Going Beyond The Diamond Certificate

October 20th, 2010

In a recent article from The Israeli Diamond Portal, a diamond manufacturer states, when talking about a diamond’s “smile”:
“So it can be a big embarrassment for them when they see a certificate for a beautiful, lustrous diamond with a SI1 clarity grade compared to a certificate for a cloudy diamond with a higher clarity – VS1, for example.”
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Lower Girdle Facets in Round Brilliant Diamonds

October 12th, 2010

There are still many amongst the trade and even consumers who still think that you can judge the cut of a round brilliant cut diamond by its table and depth. The more educated may also look at the crown and pavilion angles as well as the table. However, there are 24 facets on the pavilion of round brilliant cuts that play an important role in what the face up appearance of a round brilliant will look like.
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Consumer Expectations vs The Real Diamond World

October 1st, 2010

Having dealt with many customers over the years, I have become accustomed to what consumers, and indeed a lot of the trade think about diamonds versus what really is true. Below I have made a list of some of the expectations I’ve encountered and the “truth” behind them.
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