Buyer's Guide to Buy Purple Lab Grown Diamonds

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The Purple Diamond Buyers Guide

You know pink diamonds from the auction records and blue diamonds from the Hope. Purple, which joins the calm of blue to the sweetness of pink, is so rare that the most asked question about it is whether it exists at all. It does: a pure purple of just 1.99 carats brought $673,000 at auction. Here is the rarest color in the book, explained, graded, and honestly priced.

The Rarity

So Rare, People Ask If It Exists

Purple diamonds do exist, and their scarcity is the entire story. Only a few pure purple diamonds are found in the world each year: South Africa has produced some, and two regions of Russia, Yakutia and Arkhangelsk, have yielded a small number with purple as the dominant hue. Violet, purple's bluer sibling, is rarer still and came almost entirely from one place: the Argyle deposit in Western Australia, where fewer than 100 carats of violet rough were recovered in the deposit's entire history, and only 12 carats of violet were offered across 32 years of its annual tender of best stones.

Because natural purples are this scarce, treated and laboratory grown purple diamonds vastly outnumber them in the market, and that single fact organizes every purchase in the category: the origin line on the grading report is not a detail, it is the price. There are no truly famous purple diamonds in the way the Hope is famous, which itself testifies to the scarcity: the best known, the 7.34 carat vivid Purple Heart, has an unknown owner, the 3.37 carat Purple Orchid was offered in Hong Kong at $4 million in 2014, and the Argyle Violet, 2.83 carats of fancy deep grayish bluish violet from the 2016 tender, is the largest violet ever found in Australia. Purple has always been the color of royalty; a natural purple diamond is regal twice over, by hue and by census.

The Science

Purple, Violet, and an Open Question

What makes a diamond purple? Science has not settled it, which is fitting for a color this scarce. Some violet diamonds contain boron, the element behind blue; others carry traces of hydrogen instead; still others show structural distortions in the crystal lattice like those believed to cause pink. The stones are simply too rare for researchers to say for certain, so purple keeps its mystery along with its price.

What is settled is the distinction the laboratory draws. Technically, purple is a blend of blue and red, while violet is its own wavelength in the spectrum, shorter than blue. GIA grades them as separate colors: purple runs redder and usually lighter in tone, wearing pastel shades of lavender, lilac, orchid, and mauve even at intense grades, while violet runs bluer and usually deeper or darker. Purple is the rarer and generally the more valuable of the two, and light purples make some of the most quietly beautiful engagement rings in all of fancy color.

The Grading

Reading a Purple Diamond's Report

Saturation is the price, as in every fancy color. The GIA scale climbs from Faint, Very Light, and Light into the fancy grades, and the price per carat jumps sharply between Fancy Light and Fancy.

Factor What to Look For
Color origin Natural, confirmed by GIA; treated and grown purples far outnumber natural ones, so this line is the price
Color grade Fancy Light through Fancy Vivid, with Fancy Deep and Dark for strong color in darker tones; purples read pastel even when intense
Secondary hue Purple is commonly modified by pink or brown, violet by gray or blue; pink flatters, brown lowers the price; last color named is dominant
Clarity Fine color forgives visible inclusions; paler purples should be eye clean at the center
Shape Ovals, cushions, radiants, pears, and emerald cuts hold color; rounds dilute it; girdles and pavilions run heavier by design
Symmetry · Polish · Fluorescence Good to Excellent on both; fluorescence none to faint

The reading rules are the standard ones: an adjective marks a slight modifier and a noun a stronger one, so a pinkish purple whispers pink while a pink purple wears it openly, and small words on the report move large sums. Only a GIA Colored Diamond Grading Report is trusted by the market for pricing a fancy color, and it confirms whether the color is natural, whether the stone is treated, and whether it is laboratory grown. We never offer a fancy colored diamond without one.

The Laboratory Grown Route

The Attainable Road to the Color

Here is the honest modern answer to a color that natural supply cannot deliver: laboratory grown purple diamonds. They are real diamonds, identical in substance to natural stones and fully disclosed as grown on their grading reports, and they put lavender, lilac, and true purple within reach of an ordinary budget, in sizes a natural purple hunt could not find in a lifetime.

The buying logic is the same clean fork as every grown fancy color. If the color is what you love, a laboratory grown purple delivers it beautifully and truthfully. If natural rarity is what you are paying collector prices for, the origin line on the report settles exactly which stone you are holding, and the price must match it. Both purchases are legitimate; the only illegitimate one is undisclosed, and disclosure is what the certificate exists to guarantee.

The Setting & The Alternatives

Serving the Purple, Three Ways

A natural purple center is a collector's budget. There are three honest roads to wearing the color.

The Setting

Rose Gold and White Contrast

Rose gold prongs, bezel, and basket warm a paler purple toward its pink side, and bright white accent diamonds in platinum or white gold deepen it by contrast. Halos and three stone designs are the classic expressions.

The Gem Road

Sapphire and Amethyst

Purple sapphire delivers rare, durable color at a small fraction of fancy diamond prices, in intensities that would carry a seven figure tag in diamond; amethyst gives fine purple at the gentlest price of all. Choosing them is fluency, not compromise.

The Reversal

Purple as the Accent

A purple diamond halo or small purple accents around a colorless center, or worked into an eternity or wedding band, puts the rarest hue in the book on her hand without the census defying center stone.

In a category where treated and grown stones outnumber natural ones, verification is the purchase, and ROSI™, our gemological intelligence, built by our gemologists, reads the full colored diamond report, origin line first, and prices the stone against the live market. Request a ROSI™ Score Report on any purple diamond before money moves.

An Honest Word
Purple is the color collectors search a lifetime for. Buy the origin line first, the hue second, and the size last.

Our checklist when hunting purples for clients: color origin natural and GIA confirmed when natural is what you are paying for, Fancy grade or better as budget allows, SI clarity clean where the eye lands, good to excellent symmetry and polish, fluorescence none to faint. And if the honest answer for your budget is a laboratory grown purple, a purple sapphire, or purple used as the accent, take it proudly; the color is the point, and all three roads arrive.

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Questions

Purple Diamond Questions, Answered

Do purple diamonds exist?
Yes, and the fact that this is the most asked question about them tells you how rare they are. Natural purple diamonds exist in such small numbers that only a few pure purples are found in the world each year; a pure purple of just 1.99 carats brought $673,000 at auction. Treated and laboratory grown purple diamonds are far more common than natural ones, which is exactly why the origin line on the grading report decides everything in this category.
What is the difference between purple and violet diamonds?
Technically, purple is a blend of blue and red, while violet is its own wavelength, shorter than blue. GIA grades them as distinct colors: purple runs redder in tone and usually lighter and more pastel, violet runs bluer and usually deeper or darker. Purple is the rarer and generally more valuable of the two. Fewer than 100 carats of violet rough were ever recovered from the Argyle deposit, the color's principal source, and only 12 carats of violet were offered across 32 years of its annual tender.
What makes a diamond purple?
Science is still not entirely sure, which is fitting for the rarest question in fancy color. Some violet diamonds carry boron, the element behind blue; others carry traces of hydrogen instead; still others show structural distortions in the crystal like those behind pink. The stones are simply too rare for research to settle it, so purple keeps its mystery along with its price.
How are purple diamonds graded?
By saturation, from Faint, Very Light, and Light into the fancy grades: Fancy Light, Fancy, Fancy Intense, and Fancy Vivid, with Fancy Deep and Fancy Dark for strong color in darker tones; the price per carat jumps sharply between Fancy Light and Fancy. Purples typically read pastel even at intense grades: lavender, lilac, orchid, mauve. Pink secondaries flatter and brown ones lower the price, violet is usually modified by gray or blue, and the last color named on the GIA report is always the dominant one.
Are lab grown purple diamonds real diamonds?
Yes. Laboratory grown purple diamonds are real diamonds, identical in substance to natural stones and fully disclosed as grown on their reports, and they are the attainable road to a color that is otherwise a collector's lifetime hunt. If the color is what you love, a laboratory grown purple delivers it honestly and beautifully; if natural rarity is what you are paying for, the GIA origin line settles which stone you are holding, and the price should match it.
What are the alternatives to a purple diamond?
Purple sapphire leads the list: beautiful, durable, genuinely rare, and a small fraction of fancy diamond prices, in shades from pastel to intensities that would carry a seven figure tag in diamond. Amethyst, the classic purple quartz, delivers fine purple at the gentlest price of all. And purple diamond can serve as the accent rather than the center: a purple halo or small purple accents around a colorless stone, or worked into an eternity band.
Talk to a Jeweler

Chasing purple? Hunt the rarest color with a gemologist.

John Anderson, our Lead Gemologist, evaluates purple and violet diamonds for origin, hue, and honest market price, natural and laboratory grown alike, and can search the market to your exact shade and budget, sapphire and amethyst included when that is the wiser road. The consultation is complimentary and there is no obligation.

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