Find Your Perfect Diamond
Made to sit flush against the engagement ring it was designed for.
Every ring is made from start to finish in our Los Angeles atelier.
Diamond Education
Both are diamond. Origin, certification, and long term value are where they part ways. A plain accounting, from a house that sells both.
A lab grown diamond is diamond. Crystallized carbon, the same hardness, the same optical behavior, the same fire under light. Set two well cut diamonds of equal quality side by side, one natural and one grown, and no naked eye tells them apart. Gemological laboratories distinguish them with specialized instruments, not with loupes.
So the honest question is not whether lab grown diamonds are real. They are. The question is what you are paying for in each case, and what each holds over time.
A natural diamond crystallized deep in the earth over a span measured in hundreds of millions to billions of years, and survived a violent trip to the surface. A grown diamond is produced in a matter of weeks in a controlled facility. Neither origin story makes the material harder or brighter. One makes it finite. Rough natural diamond of fine quality is a fixed and dwindling supply. Grown diamond is a manufactured product whose supply expands with capacity.
Our natural center diamonds carry GIA grading reports. Our lab grown diamonds are IGI certified, the laboratory that grades the majority of grown diamonds worldwide. In both cases the report is independent and the grades mean what they say.
On price, a grown diamond of comparable grade costs a fraction of its natural counterpart, and that fraction has moved steadily downward as production has scaled. This is the honest heart of the decision. The same budget buys a dramatically larger or finer grown diamond today. The natural diamond's counterargument is scarcity: manufactured supply keeps expanding, finite supply does not, and prices over the long term have reflected that difference. We will not dress either fact up as a prediction. They are the two facts.
If you want to see the fair market picture on any specific diamond, natural or grown, submit its certificate number through the ROSI™ Score Report and judge with numbers instead of adjectives.
We build engagement rings around natural diamonds and lab grown diamonds alike, made to order in our Los Angeles atelier either way. One house rule does not bend: every accent and melee diamond we set is 100 percent natural, regardless of the center diamond. Small grown melee is where corners get cut invisibly in this industry, and we decline to cut them.
Choose natural for permanence and scarcity. Choose grown for size and grade within a budget. Both choices are sound when they are made with open eyes, and our job is the open eyes.
We sell both, so we have no horse in this race. Our only allergy is to a customer choosing either one based on a claim that is not true.
Talk to a Jeweler
Weighing natural against grown for a specific budget and size? John Anderson, our Lead Gemologist, reviews diamonds and settings with clients every day. The consultation is complimentary and there is no obligation.
Speak with John Anderson1-800-779-1726 · john@rockher.com
