By
Ashley Bailey, Monday, July 31, 2006 12:00 AM
All images are Whiteflash A Cut Above Hearts & Arrows Diamonds
In the 1980s Japanese cutters were the first to produce diamonds cut so exactly that facet reflections overlapped, creating kaleidoscopic patterns when seen through reflecting viewers. The techniques spread to other cutting houses and evolved. Hearts & Arrows diamonds reached the US in the mid 1990s. Top quality H&A diamonds are valued for their uniqueness and quality as the ultimate in cutting precision. They are sometimes called superideals.
A Hearts & Arrows viewer is a reflecting optical symmetry tool. Looking through it you will see arrows radiating outward in the crown of a H&A diamond. Turn the diamond over and a circle of hearts appears in the pavilion. The arrows pattern may also be seen in light return viewers and some actual photography, but the H&A Viewer is the only tool that reveals hearts patterning. All facets must be precisely aligned to appear correctly. If any part of the diamond is even slightly asymmetric the patterns will be uneven or distorted.
US labs have no grading standards for optical symmetry, so examples of true H&A patterning are rare. H&A diamonds may have symmetrical cut, but not all are cut to ideal parameters and not all have optimum light return. As their popularity grows more factories attempt to produce them and standards have declined. If we regard the most acute level of optical symmetry as true hearts & arrows then examples of non-true hearts & arrows are much more commonplace.
Sometimes we are asked if a diamond with a top grade in 'symmetry' will show hearts & arrows. The answer is no. There is a difference between lab-graded symmetry and optical symmetry.
Whiteflash presented a grading system for optical symmetry at the International Diamond Cut Conference in Moscow in 2004. It was hoped that laboratories and peers would unite to maintain higher standards for manufacture of H&A as they have in Japan where the standard was set. Though laboratories do not offer a grade for Hearts & Arrows, Whiteflash does, and we are the only company to safeguard buyers with a guarantee of optical symmetry meeting the IDCC presentation criteria.
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