Is Genuine Moissanite Natural or Synthetic Gemstone?

Silicon carbide indeed has a potential to form crystals with structures which are almost the same as diamond structures. This is a structure of tetrahedron, where the atoms are the most evenly distributed in space, what makes a tetrahedron especially stable.

While diamond consists of carbon atoms only, moissanite is made from carbon and silicon (the later being essentially the same as atoms of carbon from crystal point of view).

This opens a very interesting opportunity to find a gemstone with characteristics comparable to the most popular precious stone of all times.

As we can see, moissanite is slightly less hard than a diamond (still much harder than a steel file, what makes it very durable and suitable for extreme conditions like usage in tools or jewelry), but it surpasses a diamond (and every other known precious stones in brilliance and fire, both most desirable characteristics of gemstones used for rings, necklaces, bracelets etc.), except for color.

Until recently a perfectly colorless moissanite was virtually impossible to get, yet latest brands like Forever One and Forever Fire managed to get very close to almost colorless gemstones, which always indicate perfection and flawlessness.

There is also a very acceptable price tag. On average moissanite is between 80 and 90 percent less expensive than a diamond of the same appearance.

But there is a catch …

Thanks to the natural occurrence of moissanite, it eventually got a nickname – a space diamond.

In the late 1980s and especially in the 1990s serious attempts to produce large single crystals of moissanite were made. After several years of research, Charles & Colvard succeeded to produce first gemstones with brilliance and fire as we expect at the top notch gemstones. Today they are still a leading producer of these precious stones coming from the laboratory.

Of course, many problems occurred by the way. For instance, not all the cuts available at diamonds were suitable at moissanite. They started with round brilliant cut and other shapes like cushion and emerald were added later. While diamonds were (and still are) always cut in the way which maximizes their weight, moissanite jewelers were always focusing on maximizing their luster and shine. This approach eventually led to the interesting situation where ’fake’ diamonds became superior to the originals.

Diamonds as a group of gems carry a large ethical baggage. They are historically by far the most problematic gemstones, causing many wars and human suffering. A significant part of today’s world production of diamonds comes with a ’conflict-free’ label but many diamonds are still made by exploitation of workers, with devastating effect on nature and their production is supported with extreme violence.

Jewelry manufacturers are well-aware or all these problems and Kimberley Process was established to solve all the conflicts related with diamond. Unfortunately a majority of mines are located in politically unstable and difficult to access areas, where unsafe conditions and work for less than a dollar per day are still the way to go.

None of these issues were ever addressed on moissanite gemstones. Each one of them is made in a lab, all workers (we should say engineers) and taxes are paid and full procedure, from the initial crystallization seed to the end buyer who pops the »Will you marry me?« question.

To be honest, moissanite are not the only alternatives to diamonds. We should mention at least one huge group of stones especially popular in the wedding industry – a cubic zirconia. So where is the difference between cubic zirconia and moissanite?

We are dealing with the state of the art technology, lots of experimental work done by top authorities in mineralogy, inorganic chemistry, crystallography and other hi-tech areas. Advanced computers and superb robots are used for analyzing the products perfectly cutting gemstones for a still relatively small market.

Until recently all moissanite possessed a small amount of greyish or greenish (green is particularly characteristic) occlusions, what puts them in the range of F or lower comparing with diamonds (D is considered as the best possibility on the market). It is important to know such diamonds are meant just for white gold, platinum or similar settings because yellow one would neglect the colorlessness of the stone.

For this reason, numerous buyers don’t really care about the grade of color, because they plan to put the stone in yellow, rose or similarly colored setting anyway. Diamond graded between G and J is considered as a best-buy option for such buyers and having lots of moissanite with way better grades this problem is relatively unimportant.

On the other way, the market for colored stones is growing. If somebody wants blue, green, yellow or pink stone, moissanite offers at least as much as colored diamonds. In this case, gradation is completely different than the one presented above.

There is another important fact to consider. Technology for making moissanite is improving year after year and several enhancements were made – leading to Neo, Supernova, Forever Brilliant, Forever One and the ultimate compound of silicon and carbon grown in star-like conditions: Amora Gem. Amora Gems surpass diamonds even in their traditionally untouchable category – hardness, but are in such demand, you have to enter a waiting list if you want to buy one.

For several decades cubic zirconia was the only important alternative to diamonds. This lovely inexpensive stone is built in nice, yet sometimes relatively unattractive jewelry, which is relatively easily scratched and the stone as the main attraction with time pretty soon becomes somehow dull (it looses luster).

With moissanite, new attractive alternative entered the market, where a fresh generation with different economic, ethical and environmental values, accepted it as a new standard. We’ll very likely change the famous »Diamonds are forever« with another one with moissanite in.

At this occasion we would like to thank:

https://www.charlesandcolvard.com/ for incredible resource on moissanite

http://mydreamweddingideas.com/ for the insight in the latest wedding jewelry fads

https://www.jhollywooddesigns.com/ for keeping up with the trends in gemstones


All used photos and clip arts are Public Domain and both tables are my own work, published under the Creative Commons 4.0 license.

As far for diamond alternatives are considered there is still a lot of to explore, especially for stones larger than two and a half karats and we are looking forward to finding out what will the future bring.