How to Select a Chocolate Diamond

Diamonds come in a variety of hues including amber, champagne and rich chocolate brown.

Although clear or white diamonds remain the biggest sellers, diamonds naturally occur in a wide range of colors. Rare red and blue diamonds fetch the highest prices; brown diamonds are the most common and cost the least. As fashion trends embrace earth tones, jewelers produce more of these warm-hued diamonds to meet the demand for attractive colored gems. To brown diamond aficionados, chocolate diamond jewelry looks as appealing as it sounds.

Things You'll Need

• Polishing cloth
• Jeweler's loupe

Instructions

1. Pick a color. The term "chocolate diamond" has no official designation; marketers may refer to brown diamonds with a host of appetizing descriptions, including champagne diamonds, cognac diamonds and chocolate diamonds. Chocolate diamonds typically have the most robust brown hues.

2. Dust the stone with a jeweler's cloth before giving it a closer look. Oils from fingers collect on diamond surfaces and leave them looking duller than they should. Giving the diamond's upper surfaces a quick polish makes it look its best.

3. Use a jeweler's loupe to examine the stone. Diamond graders rank stones according to the "four C's" of cut, color, clarity and carat weight. Color is a matter of taste with chocolate diamonds and that makes the other three C's that much more meaningful.

4. Look at the center of the stone under strong light using the jeweler's loupe. Dark diamonds camouflage small flaws more readily than white diamonds, so look closely for black spots or cloudiness that could reduce the diamond's brilliance.

5. Look at the stone's setting if it has one. A well-set diamond has symmetrical prongs or an even bezel surrounding it. Prongs should cover any exposed points in princess, marquise or pear-shaped designs and there should be no play within the setting.

6. Compare the most prominent chocolate diamond to other diamonds within the jewelry, if any. Designs that feature multiple chocolate diamonds should contain identical stones unless gradients or color changes are a part of the design.

Tips & Warnings

• Like other diamonds, chocolate diamonds cost more per carat for larger stones because larger raw diamonds are rare.

• Chocolate diamonds have all the optical properties of white diamonds, but their color obscures some of their fire; the scintillant spectral colors of white diamonds do not appear in darker stones.

References

• Rapaport Diamond Report; Celebrating Brown; Diana Jarrett; June 1, 2007
• Gemological Institute of America: Hot Chocolate: Fall Fashions Favor Cocoa-Colored Gems
• The Mineral and Gemstone Kingdom; The Precious Gemstone Diamond; Hershel Friedman