A rose cut is a way diamond cutters can give shape to a gemstone or diamond. It’s one of the first established ways to cut a stone, although it was not the first type of cut. At first when people started to wear diamonds in jewellery around the 12th century, they process the diamonds as they were found in nature. Later on in the 13th century, they would start cutting off some edges to give the diamond the opportunity to shine a little bit inside a jewel but to still keep their natural shape. Diamonds were very rare which made them only obtainable for royals.
Finally diamond cutters would start transforming them in rose cut diamonds with self crafted tools in the 16th century. The goal was to cut the diamonds in such a way that the candle light would reflect beautiful on their big facets. This makes the reflections of a rose cut diamond warmer then the ones from a brilliant cut that is invented much later.
Therefore every rose cut diamond is unique, although there were standards to how you should cut one. So does every rose cut diamond has a flat back. On top there are 3 up to 24 facettes. Because of the flat back, all the carats are on top of it. What you see is what you get. Viewing from above a rose cut diamond of 0.5 ct will look much bigger than a brilliant cut diamond of 0.5 ct.
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| In this picture you can see the facets come together at the top to form a rose. |
The name rose originates from the fact that these facettes on top of the diamond terminate at the top in a single apex. If you look with a bit of creativity, you can see the petals of a rose unfold.
Rose cut diamonds appear in all sorts of shapes like pear, marquise and oval. But round shapes are the most common. They also appear in different colours of diamonds like champagne, black, rustic colours and opaque. Because nature doesn’t only give us diamonds but also other gemstones, diamond cutters in this period also cutted rubies, tourmalines and sapphires in rose cut.
Rose cut diamonds and other gemstones are getting rear because recutting them now into a brilliant shape will make the diamond more worth. Although we think nothing is more worth then a lovely antique handcrafted jewel with rose cut diamonds which is probably crafted in the Gregorian or Victorian era.
