Advances In Diamond Identification Enhance Industry Transparency And Build Trust

Diamond identification and diamond grading reports have long played crucial roles in the Swiss watch and fine jewelry industries. Considering the incommensurable quantity of lab-grown, a.k.a. synthetic, diamonds present within the natural diamond supply chain, identification and grading reports are of urgent importance today.

Jewelry trade publications such as JCK are reporting ever more instances of lab-grown diamonds bearing fraudulent inscriptions linked to grading reports for natural gems. These impostors possess characteristics and measurements almost identical to the natural diamonds that received the original lab reports. What’s more, some manufacturers, wittingly or not, are producing jewelry and watches that they market as containing natural diamonds when in fact they contain synthetics. “Given that the resale value of lab-grown diamonds is next to nothing,” said Soraya Cayen, owner of the Carmel, CA. jewelry salon, Cayen Collection, “retailers and consumers alike are understandably seeking confirmation that their diamond is a naturally mined one.” Cayen, who carries one-of-a-kind diamond jewelry by such globally esteemed brands as David Webb, Bayco and Sylvie Corbelin, also designs diamond jewelry for her Cayen Collection range.

Whether you’re an industry professional or shopping for diamond jewels or diamond watches, experts like Cayen suggest following due diamond diligence rules to help make the best-informed decisions. To begin with, Rule #1: research your suppliers until you find one you trust. Rule #2 is to only buy stones that are accompanied by a grading report from a reputable gemological laboratory that has identified them as either naturally mined or lab-grown. “A gemological lab report can help ensure that the diamond you are purchasing has been vetted by experts and properly identified as either natural or a synthetic product,” noted gemologist Jean-Pierre Chalain, head of the diamond department at the Swiss Gemmological Institute SSEF, a non-profit research foundation based in Basel, Switzerland.

“Diamond grading reports are essential because they can protect jewelers and consumers alike from buying undisclosed lab-grown diamonds (LGDs), which are also called synthetics,” said Hutton Wilkinson, owner and creative director of Tony Duquette, a Beverly Hills, CA. company that has bejeweled everyone from the late Duchess of Windsor to Sharon Stone. “Synthetics can end up in jewels or watches marketed as containing natural diamonds,” Wilkinson observed. “Synthetics are sometimes discovered after the customer takes a piece in for repairs or takes it to a grading laboratory after purchase.” If and when a customer learns that their diamond is something other than natural, Wilkinson related, “This discovery can trigger emotional distress or marital arguments. Of course, it can also damage the reputation of the jeweler who sold it to that customer.”

Rule #3 involves understanding that natural diamonds occasionally get mixed into batches of synthetics. (In October 2022, JCK reported that a Kay Outlet listing for ¼ ct. t.w. synthetic, a.k.a. LGD earrings noted, “Due to supply constraints, these earrings may include natural diamonds.”) Yes, you read that correctly: a shortage of synthetic diamonds meant that the Kay Outlet had to resort to using natural ones. Adding more mystery to the diamond mix, while reputable gemological laboratories have been grading natural diamonds for decades and identifying lab-grown ones since the early 2000s, they’ve never been able to identify whether the tiniest melee stones are natural or synthetic/lab-grown. That is, until now, which leads us to Rule #4: stay informed about diamond screening advances, and utilize them to your best advantage.

A new screening device is disrupting and demystifying melee and it’s called the ASDI-500. This automated small diamond screener has the precision and power to differentiate between hyper-tiny round colorless and polished melee ranging from 500 microns (0.02 inches or 0.5 mm) in diameter to 3.80 mm wide. (To better put these widths in perspective, the size of a typical human hair strand is about 0.12 mm). The first ever device to evaluate large quantities of very small melee, the intrepid ASDI-500 can analyze 700 stones in an hour, detecting and separating lab-grown diamonds and diamond simulants from masses of natural diamonds. Note: humans are nowhere near capable of performing this type and volume of work within the same time frame.

A few words about melee: while melee originally contained 17 facets (known as single cut melee) compared to a round brilliant’s 58, cutters can replicate the 57-58 facet design of larger modern round brilliant diamonds into stones that weigh 0.10ct (10 points) and down to 1.0 mm (0.006 ct). Always been a major element in accenting watches or diamond and colored stone jewelry, melee has long been sprinkled into to create twinkling pavé. Over the past 20 years, melee has become more commonly used as diamond-accented watches and halo settings in engagement rings have risen in popularity. Tiny melee diamonds create dramatic effects for an affordable price, and because it’s worth anywhere from $400 to $800 per carat, melee, despite its small size, is actually quite valuable. Up until now, there has not been an automatic machine that can authenticate melee diamonds between approximately 0.50 mm and 1.00 mm.

Created by the Swiss Gemmological Institute (SSEF) in collaboration with the Swiss robotics company Unimec SA, the ASDI-500 came on the market in November, 2022. The ASDI-500 is a direct descendant of the ASDI, which was created and introduced in 2014 to help the Swiss watch and jewelry industries maintain quality control and trust by screening batches of natural diamonds to detect any undisclosed synthetics and simulants that may have found their way in. “The ASDI was the very first device able to automatically authenticate large batches of colorless diamonds,” said SSEF’s Chalain. “Now the ASDI-500 is the very first automatic authentication device for the tiniest melee.”

Emmanuel Remonnay, CEO of UNIMEC SA described the genesis of the ASDI-500 in an email. “In 2020,” he began, “SSEF approached UNIMEC with the crazy idea of developing a device to authenticate small diamonds, as no reliable technology or means of analysis existed on the market for stones between 0.5 and 0.8mm. In addition, the new method of analysis had to be affordable and easy to use for a wide range of clients including producers, diamond traders and end users. It was more than a challenge,” he declared. “It was the conquest of a new world of diamond analysis that lay ahead.”

Soon a development team of SSEF and UNIMEC experts formed and as Remonnay related, “Everything was reinvented, the analysis tool which required thousands of measurements for its development and validation, the handling of the stones which required a very high degree of positioning accuracy but also a great robustness and a guarantee of reliability, as well as the analysis and automation software.” According to Remonnay, “We are proud to have met and exceeded our objectives, the equipment is now available for commercialization; it authenticates and counts diamonds precisely. The device is compact, its touch screen interface is easy to use, and the results of the diamonds analysis are amazing, with an extremely low refer rate, which means ‘refer to further tests’ and applies to unidentified stones set aside by the instrument for further testing.” With the aim of becoming “a major player in the industry,” Remonnay noted that, “Our work does not stop with the ASDI-500. We are currently working on solutions for large quantities of stones, but also on other analysis and handling protocols.”

Ever since the ASDI-500 was introduced during the Gem Geneve trade show in November, 2022, watch and jewelry executives have been taking notice. In a face-to-face interview, Julien Tornare, CEO and President of the Swiss luxury watch company Zenith, said that the ASDI-500 screening device fills a longstanding gap in the industry “and can help lead to fuller disclosure of materials” for watch manufacturers, jewelers, designers and retailers. “It is our responsibility to accurately identify the nature of the materials we are using, and then communicate that information to customers,” Tornare said. Zenith, which is owned by the global luxury holding company LVMH and has been manufacturing timepieces in Le Locle, Switzerland since 1865, uses diamonds in its DEFY Mindnight, Elite Moonphase and Elite Classic models. “In the prestige jewelry and watch trades, massive amounts of melee are used every month,” he observed. “The more transparent we are regarding materials and sourcing, the more accurately we can represent our products to retailers, consumers and the media. Everybody wins,” he concluded.