Diamond cut or shaped into a circular outline or circumference, with a cone-shaped pavilion. The standard round brilliant diamond has 57 or 58 facets, and is the most popular style of cutting.
Round Brilliant Cut
Saturation
Intensity and purity of colour in a diamond. Both cape series diamonds and fancy shape diamonds are graded on a scale of increasing saturation, in addition to hue and tone.
Radiant Cut
Diamond cut or shaped into a square or rectangular princess cut, with the corners cut off.
Red Diamond
A coloured diamond with a natural red body colour. Red must be the predominant colour, but it may be modified by shades of pink or purple. The colour in natural red diamonds is created by irregular crystal structure. Natural red diamonds are the most rare of all diamonds. Some red coloured diamonds with sufficient saturation fall into the valuable fancy red colour category of diamonds.
Princess Cut
Diamond cut or shaped into a square or rectangle. Princess cuts combine features of both step cut and brilliant cut diamonds.
Proportion Grade
Qualitative analysis of the overall proportions on a round brilliant cut diamond. Fancy shaped diamonds are not proportion graded; unlike round cut diamonds, there is no defined range of proportion standards for fancy shapes.
Proportions
Relations between the dimensions and angles of a finished diamond. Examples of specific proportions are table size, depth percentage, and crown angle. Proportions are extremely important to the beauty, brilliance, and life in a diamond. Click here to learn more about proportions on a diamond grading report.
Polished Girdle
Describes the girdle of a diamond that has been fully polished smooth and clear around the entire perimeter. Step cut diamonds such as emerald cut and baguette cut diamonds usually have a polished girdle, and some brilliant cut diamonds may have polished girdles as well.
Polish Grade
Qualitative analysis of the overall surface condition of a diamond. The quality of polish is determined by the care put in by a polisher when finishing a diamond, and is important to the brilliance and scintillation given off by a diamond.
Point
Term for one hundredth of a carat. For example, a fifteen-point diamond weighs 0.15 carats. It could also be called a fifteen “pointer”.