You only need tap the word diamond into your emoji menu to know what the most universal diamond cut of all is – the modern round brilliant cut. It’s the one you see in every cartoon version of a diamond ring, the vast majority of proposals on film and television, the most sparkling, classic shape of the stone in every engagement scene. It accounts for over half of all engagement ring purchases in the US.
The classic brilliant-cut diamond may be the most light-reflective of all, its 58 facets cut in such a way as to create the most ‘brightness, fire, scintillation, and pattern’ – all modern conventions that dictate how are a diamond cut is prized, but that’s not to say it’s the only one. Far from it.
Diamonds today come in myriad cuts, from classic emerald-cuts to beautiful pear-cuts, pretty ovals, heart-cuts, and even Hello Kitty faces and horse-heads (OK, the latter is a particularly niche sector of the market.) But there’s also a whole array of cuts that aren’t about maximizing brilliance and fire.
So, here’s to the wonky ones – the imperfect, askew, limpid, and subtle ones – the most subtle of all being the actual rough crystal barely touched other than given a clean once prized from the Earth. They’ve been around since diamonds were first discovered in India in the 4th century BC, and prized for their hardness and natural octahedral form. (That ‘diamond’ shape we refer to in geometry? That’s exactly the shape many rough diamonds are found in when mined.)
It wasn’t until the 14th century that it was discovered that diamond dust was hard enough to polish diamonds, so people simply smoothed out the gemstone’s natural facets, resulting in shinier versions of the rough crystal. The following centuries would see technology enable people to actually facet (create those many tiny flat surfaces that bounce light around), resulting in cuts like the table cut, rose cut, and old mine cut.
It would be another 600 years before that light-maximising, modern brilliant cut came about, revolutionizing the diamond industry standard and making them the uber-sparkling gemstones we’re so familiar with today. So, despite diamonds having been discovered more then 2,000 years ago, it’s only in the last 100 years we’ve seen them obtain their maximum sparkle.
But that’s not to say that the cuts that came before (and since) aren’t also to be adored. Take the portrait cut – a window pane-like cut that was loved by 16th century Mughal Indians for its clarity and ability to be set over miniature portraits. The Georgians were fans too and would set them over tiny paintings surrounded by sparkling stones.
Today, US jeweler Kelty Pelechy, who specializes in antique cuts, uses portrait cut stones in an entirely modern way, setting them backless in rings or pendants, so the light shines through, or placing tiny modern miniature paintings – of a lover’s eye, perhaps – behind them.
Leen Heyne, an extraordinarily talented Dutch jeweler, sets antique portrait cuts in his singular, twisted metal rings, leaving some of their edges exposed for the wearer to marvel at.
Darya Khonsary of Darius Jewels uses an array of antique cuts, including the beautiful Peruzzi cut, a 17th century cut developed by the Venetian diamond cutter Vincenzo Peruzzi, a beautifully rough, cushion-shaped style. She might set a slightly mismatched pair of them side by side in a butter-yellow Fairmined gold ring, leaving their facets beautifully exposed to the light.
Acclaimed Indian jeweler Viren Bhagat has a particularly modern take on antique cuts, having his specialist cutters create modified versions for his extraordinary designs, some defying description. His La Plume D’Aigrette brooch, for example, sees variations of baguette cuts, pear and rose cuts, long marquise cuts (think of a skinny, pointed oval) with large top facets, and everything in between.
For the simplest expression of diamond jewelry, Maya Bjornsten sets lightly polished diamond crystals into the most minimalist claw settings, allowing the stone to look for all the world like it was just plucked from the ground. In this case, the Copenhagen-based designer has gone full circle, skipping over 2,000 years of diamond cutting history to go right back to the simplest expression of diamonds of all – the ones that are simply mined, cleaned, and set. Because sometimes a diamond in its natural form is the most beautiful diamond of all.
Words by Annabel Davidson, a London-based jewellery obsessive who edits, writes, styles, consults and generally bangs on about everything pertaining to the jewellery
