As Chris Brown once sang, “Them yellow diamonds in my chain, yeah… That must mean I’m rich!” (click for audio: youtube link)
Fancy yellow diamonds are rare, beautiful and the color of the sun! 🙂
First of all, what IS a fancy yellow diamond? And what makes it so fancy? First of all, calling a diamond fancy yellow is a technical definition. All diamonds are graded on a scale ranging from D to Z. D being completely colorless and Z being your “light yellow diamonds” or the industry term would call them “champagne diamonds”. In all frankness, these “champagne” diamonds are not worth very much since they are abundant and generally considered to be undesirable so jewellers had to come up with a pretty name… it’s the same with the “princess cut” diamond but that will be another blog post. SO, getting back on topic… the value of diamonds is rather extreme, it has to be either completely colorless or completely saturated with color! A fancy yellow diamond is a category a diamond falls into that is beyond the Z color. At this point, we are seeing yellow like a canary bird, ok? And these are graded as either “Fancy Yellow”, “Fancy Intense” or “Fancy Vivid” – Vivid being the most yellow. Personally, I like Fancy Intense grade because I actually find Fancy Vivid’s almost too yellow. Clarity grading remains the same.
There is only 1 yellow diamond to every 10,000 colorless diamonds! And while the rarity of this gem is understood within the diamond business, I find it particularly strange that the price does not reflected its rarity. Yellow diamonds are similarly priced as colorless diamonds. There have been a significant increase in popularity and interest in yellow diamonds over the past say, 2-3 years with Tiffany & Co leading the way with the launch of their yellow diamond collection. As a result, many jewelers followed suit. And who can forget the famed Tiffany Yellow Diamond? While the yellow diamond is part of Tiffany’s heritage, it has not had a marketable collection until recently.
With the interest in fancy yellow diamonds, I have seen many come into the market – however, I believe they may not be as readily available for very much longer. With Rio Tinto’s announced closure of the Argyle diamond mine in Australia, you can be guaranteed the price of yellow diamonds to take off. Why? Argyle produces large amounts of Fancy Yellow Diamonds and is also the top producer of Pink Diamonds in the world.
Since prices are directly related to supply, demand and rarity… it would be only a matter of time before we see the prices of yellow diamonds start to rise substantially. So, if you’ve been coveting a pretty yellow diamond, now would be a good time to look into purchasing one or two, or three 😉
Happy Shopping!
-Blingologist
BlinGologist 