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This is a word used in the jewellery trade primarily to describe small accent Diamonds. In India, where the majority of the world’s accent Diamonds are now cut, the term is used to describe Diamonds weighing from 0.001ct (1/1000th of a carat) to 0.18ct (just under a 1/5th of a carat).
The majority of all cut Diamonds on the planet are Melée and their route from mine to jewellery is sometimes even more convoluted than that of coloured gemstones. After clearing customs where origin and ethical compliance is checked, the gems are sent to the Lapadarist.
Once faceted, these small diamonds are normally sold in India as small parcels: these can change hand three or four times a day and as they are exchanged, parcels are often merged to form larger parcels. Melée traders sometimes add as little as a quarter of one percent to the price of the parcel, which may seem like an unbelievably small profit margin, but a good trader will do several trades per day.
Once the Diamonds arrive at a jeweller, the first job is to sort them by size. The majority will have been faceted as round cut gemstones and will normally be one of the sizes in the chart on the adjacent page.
The initial sorting is done with a sieve and once all the similar-sized stones are together, the work of the sorter is to then put them into smaller batches of similar colour and clarity. This is a real art and one that you need to specialise in; even those who are professionally trained in sorting larger diamonds and coloured gemstones will struggle to do this task. I once spent four hours in a Diamond sorting room just trying to learn the principles of the grader’s work and I lost count of the number of Diamonds that shot out of my tweezers. In fact, the majority of my time was spent on hands and knees trying to search for something less than 1mm in size that was colourless!
The job of setting the Melée Diamonds is also a real art. Depending on the type of setting this can take up to 15 minutes. When you consider, for example, that a piece of jewellery such as a Lorique ring may feature over one hundred accent Diamonds, you begin to appreciate the total amount of work that has gone into the sorting and setting of the Diamonds. And what’s more, we haven’t yet considered the first step of turning the rough piece of Diamond into a sparkling faceted gem! Even at 1mm in size, these gems are still cut and faceted by hand and will often have 17 facets applied.
Whilst it is true that smaller Diamonds are less expensive than bigger Diamonds, the cost of faceting, sorting and setting smaller pieces can often add up to a price similar to or even greater than that of a single large Diamond of the equivalent combined weight.
However, within our 8 years trading experience in coloured gemstones and Diamonds, what has become apparent is that there is very little consistency in how melee Diamonds are graded, and two separate valuations of a piece of jewellery featuring Melée Diamonds will often yield very different opinions. In fact, some qualified gemmologists will refuse to grade smaller Diamonds at all! Also, the GIA grading method of Diamonds (F, IF, VVSi, VSi, Si and I) can be quite difficult to comprehend. And so, we have invested a lot of time and energy developing our own grading system for the clarity of melee Diamonds, which we believe is easy to understand. When it comes to Diamond colour, we have stuck with the GIA system, which uses a scale D-Z. This is because this system is easy to understand, and has much better consistency.
Melée Diamond Grades
A1
These are amongst the finest clean Diamond accents on the market and would typically be graded VSi or above.
A2
These are very high grade accent Diamonds and look stunning with either Platinum or 18k gold and would typically be graded at Si or above.
A3
Beautiful accent Diamonds offering possibly the best value for a very nice look. We will often use these in high end 9k pieces and our 18k jewellery. Typically these would grade as I1 or I2.
A4
With a magnifying glass you will expect to find inclusions in these Diamonds and occasionally will see them with the naked eye. We typically use these in 9k gold designs. Typically these would grade as I2 or I3 Diamond.
A5
Slightly cloudy Diamonds, however these still should be surface clean. We often use these in 9k and silver designs. You may see one or two inclusions with the naked eye. These would be typically be graded as PK1 or PK2.
A6
Our entry level surface clean Diamonds, typically used in silver designs. Without the aid of magnification you will typically see inlcusions in these. These would be typically graded as PK3 or lower.
A7
These Diamonds have surface chips and cracks and are normally only used in our promotional silver designs.
A8
These Diamonds are typically opaque and have major surface chips and cracks. We only use these Diamonds in our stranded jewellery designs.
View our Melee Diamonds video
