Besides being a girl’s best friend, we’re here to tell you what Marilyn Monroe hasn’t told you about diamonds…they can be grown in labs! Diamonds are precious stones, the only gems made of a single element: Carbon. The carbon structure is formed under specific conditions occurring at high temperatures and pressures. These conditions are naturally found deep underground, between 150 and 250 km under the surface of the earth.
What Marilyn Monroe also neglected to say is that lab-grown diamonds can be the 2022 girl’s best friend and that they are set to be the next big thing if we all want to manifest a better, more eco-friendly, sustainable world. See the world through FTA’s sparkling eyes, dive into the world of lab grown diamonds and discover the Arab-founded brands that are adopting them.
Carat, Color, Clarity and Cut
Lab grown diamonds are also known as synthetic diamonds, or cultured diamonds, and are produced in laboratories thanks to cutting edge technologies that reproduce the same conditions needed to create one at the high pressures and temperatures conducive to diamond formation. A lab grown diamond holds the same optical, physical and chemical properties as a mined diamond, they are chemically identical to mined diamonds and they both meet the official definition of a diamond today. Both are certified and graded using the same process and evaluated using the 4C’s (carat, color, clarity and cut) and are officially certified by globally recognized certification bodies such as the IGI (International Gemological Institute) or the GIA (Gemological Institute of America).
Lab grown vs natural diamonds
The only difference between the two is their ethical and environmental impact. The environmental impact of everything is being assessed nowadays and although new standards and certifications are being put into place, mined diamonds form deep underground and their extraction requires mining and digging massive holes in the earth or the seabed. Mining involves a highly polluting extraction process and is one of the major causes of deforestation, not to mention the often appalling conditions for those working in the mines. Lab grown diamonds require seven times less water and produce twenty times less CO2 than a mined diamond of the same quality.
Arab jewelry Maisons using lab grown diamonds
FYNE was founded by Aya Ahmad in 2019. Born into a family of diamantaries, Ahmad was the first woman to work in the family business and the first to create ethical pieces using consciously sourced diamonds with 18-carat gold. Although she lived in the diamond capital of the world, Antwerp, Ahmad saw the potential of starting a brand in Dubai. She decided to use lab grown diamonds as she established ‘FYNE’ as an ethical jewelry brand with sustainability at its core. The brand also uses recyclable materials and packaging as well as a made-to-order business model to further reduce waste.
Meet Maissa Zard, founder of Loyal.E Paris, a maison that creates using lab-grown diamonds that are available today on Farfetch.com. Committed to ensuring there’s no compromise between beauty and ethics, Loyal.E Paris and Zard believe that diamonds should be conflict-free and climate-neutral. They carefully select lab grown diamonds of the highest quality standards in terms of color, clarity and cut. All of their diamonds have a color rating of D, E or F (colorless), a clarity rating of IF, VVS or VS, and an Ideal or Excellent cut. In addition, all their diamonds are certified climate neutral. They deliver an IGI certificate with all their diamonds of one carat or above and they source direct, with no middlemen involved. This allows them to secure the highest quality diamonds, with complete traceability, and without unnecessary markups.
Damas has championed the ‘Gaia’ collection which represents the first man-made diamonds in the region. Gaia represents the brand’s commitment towards sustainability, preservation of the planet and ethical practices as they transform the diamonds we know today into the diamonds of the future. The collection was designed for the women of tomorrow, who appreciate elegance in its purest form and put great importance on giving back to the environment.
This Dubai-based fine jewelry brand launched their outstanding lab grown diamonds in 2020 to offer consumers quality, value, sustainability and assurances that their pieces have been created using safe, clean working conditions. This conscious decision to offer laboratory-grown diamonds comes as the brand observed a steady increase in the number of customers looking for ethically sourced stones. The sustainable collection from Tanaché Jewels features 25 unique styles including rings, earrings, bracelets and necklaces. As with their other collections, they offer customers the opportunity to custom design bespoke pieces according to their individual preferences.
