From Ashes to Lab-Created Diamonds: A New Treasure in Memory
Diamonds are precious, pure, and clean. They are the opposite of today's cemeteries, which are overcrowded, often abandoned, and difficult to maintain a real connection with the dead. As space shortages and population growth challenge the traditional model of the cemetery, creating a memorial diamond with the ashes of a deceased loved one is a new way to keep the people we love forever beside us. A diamond will last forever and can be passed on to children, grandchildren, or other family members so that we never lose the memory and closeness of those who passed away.
Traditional funerals vs. cremation diamonds
That's why people liked the idea that the dead loved ones may become a beautiful diamond - something you can touch and enjoy looking at. The grief families who experienced the loss also like the fact that the diamonds stay and can be kept and passed from one generation to another. It's not something you end up throwing away, as you sometimes do with ashes after cremation.
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Turn your beloved’s cremation ashes into a forever diamond
With the Covid-19 pandemic impacting the entire world, many traditional funerals have been suspended to reduce crowds and slow the spread of the virus. As a result, mourners often had to postpone funerals. This led to more cremations, which had become an increasingly common option as a cheaper alternative to caskets and graves. However, more cremations mean more ashes and the dilemma of how to deal with them.
When you choose cremation as a less pricey alternative to traditional burials, and now your loved one has been cremated to this handful of ashes, what could you do with them next? Putting them in an urn isn't an attractive idea, and scattering them to the wind seems not sentimental enough…
Nowadays, instead of living with cremated remains, people are seeking better ways to memorize and honor the passing of their loved ones. In response, companies are offering services that turn ashes into lab-grown diamonds and even use this cremation diamond to make memorial jewelry. No more uncomfortable ashes, the remains are “crystallized”, and the grieving families can feel a meaningful connection with their departed by wearing this keepsake jewelry.
Lab-grown diamond from ashes: A new way to honor your loved ones
Although only a few organizations can make diamonds from cremation ashes in countries where traditional burial is predominant due to religious beliefs and other reasons, this service is already very common in countries like Switzerland or Japan. It has also become a hot topic in the United States.
A lab-grown diamond made from ashes
People who choose to turn their departed into gems love the fact that they can customize and choose the exact cut and color of the diamond they want, along with a unique jewelry setting. This makes honoring beloved ones a more personal experience. The process of creating a memorial diamond has been a meaningful part of the grieving process and produced beautiful keepsakes for numerous families.
Diamonds represent solid love that lasts forever. Although synthetic diamonds are created in laboratories, they share the same optical, physical, and chemical properties as precious natural-mined diamonds. This means that cremation diamonds are as sturdy and immortal as everlasting love and remembrance, and can be perfect mementos to represent the memories contained inside.
How to create a diamond from ashes of the person you love?
Both lab-grown diamonds and diamonds from nature are gemstones that compose a single element: Carbon. In comparison, the human body is extraordinarily complex and mainly comprised of oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, calcium, and phosphorus. As carbon is the second common element in the human body which makes up 18% of the body by mass, modern technology makes it possible to grow diamonds from the carbon extracted from cremated ashes or human hair.
The process of creating a cremation diamond with the ashes of a deceased person requires that the body be cremated first. For people who have chosen a traditional funeral, it is also possible to create a memorial diamond by using the hair of their departed loved ones as an alternative to the ashes. Once the ashes or hair are obtained, they are marked with a number so that they cannot be contaminated. Next, the company responsible for processing the diamond will perform a chemical analysis of the cremated remains.
Extract carbon from human ashes or hairs to create diamonds
At this point, the process of creating the diamond begins: First, the laboratory will extract the carbon from the ashes or hair from which the diamond will be created. Then, through various chemical processes, the purified carbon will be turned into graphite, which will later be subjected to the same conditions that create real diamonds in an HPHT (high pressure and high temperature) machine to create rough diamonds. At this step, the lab experts can add different microelements to create different colors for the diamonds.
The gemstone will be polished, cut, and cleaned according to the customer's needs. Finally, the diamond undergoes rigorous quality control and then will be graded and issued a certification of authenticity by GIA or IGI. If the customers wish, they can also request a personalized laser-micro engraving on the diamond. The whole process will take approximately ten months to a year. The newly created diamond can be set or mounted in personalized memorial jewelry.
How big of a diamond can be made from ashes or hair?
In general, the laboratories will need about 100 grams of cremation ashes or 10 grams of hair to create synthetic diamonds. On the one hand, the bigger the diamonds are requested, the more materials will be needed. On the other hand, the size of the diamond depends on how long the graphite was left in the machine: the longer it was left in, the bigger the diamond will be. But the quality of the ash can also influence the size of the lab-grown diamonds.
1 carat diamonds from cremation ashes
Some people may become larger diamonds than others if their remains contain a larger amount of carbon. The standard size of a cremation diamond is 1 carat. Still, companies like EverDear™ can provide a size choice from 0.1 carats to 2.29 carats.
It is also possible for customers to make several diamonds from the same person, to prevent losing their deceased loved one forever if they lost the first diamond created from the cremation remains.
In fact, some people, especially in Japan, who choose the cremation diamond services, request to produce several diamonds from the same ashes so that each family member has one. In theory, depending on the quantity and quality of the ashes, up to 50 diamonds could be made from each person. In practice, to date, no more than nine have ever been made.
The value of cremation diamonds: Precious memories, priceless treasure
People might be interested in the idea of turning the ashes of a dearly departed person into a diamond. However, before getting started, there may also be questions about how much it costs to have a loved one's ashes turned into a diamond.
The cost of memorial diamonds may vary depending on the carat size, color, and cut you choose. It can also be largely influenced by which company you are ordering from. In the United States, most of the minimum pricing provided by Companies offering cremation diamond services ranges between $1400 and $2999.
But there are also companies like EverDearTM that offer the most affordable prices on the market, starting from $895 for a 0.1 carat yellow diamond. This gives the families a more economical choice to keep their precious memories into an eternity form.
Are diamonds made from ashes valuable?
The lab-grown diamonds made from human ashes and hairs are also real diamonds. They have all the physical and chemical properties of natural-mined diamonds. Obviously, man-made diamonds are worth less than natural ones since they are grown in the laboratory. But it is impossible to distinguish cremation diamonds from natural diamonds with the naked eye. Not even a jeweler can tell them apart. The only way to identify them is by chemical analysis or trained gemologists using special equipment.
Cremation diamonds may have less monetary value than natural diamonds. However, we don’t make a diamond from a loved family member's remains just to resale for money. Value can be measured in a variety of different ways. Items that are of little monetary value may be of the most sentimental value. In this case, what matters is the connection between the items and the story they tell, not their individual value. The true value of the remembrance diamonds is what they represent – the priceless memories with the beloved who can never be seen again.
Keep the memories aside as your most treasured possessions
A memorial diamond ring made out of ashes to keep your loved one aside
When we remember those we have lost, it is often not the financially valuable items that matter most, even though they are most likely to be formally passed down in a will. For those who are left behind, it is these very personal items that represent memories that are most emotionally important.
It has been said that "when someone you love becomes a memory, that memory becomes a treasure." With the help of modern technology, you are able to turn their cremated remains into memorial diamonds in a tangible way, making this metaphor even closer to reality.
Just because a grieving family must find a way to move on with their lives, does not mean that the pain of losing a loved one will end, or that the departed loved one will be forgotten. Most people carry this grief with them throughout their lives; they will gradually become a part of us. A diamond from ashes helps people heal this pain in the form of keeping a piece of the loved one closely aside; the pain should gradually become easier to bear, and your memories and love for that person will live on forever.
For people who lost a family member shortly before a wedding, they can have a diamond made from his or her ashes and set in the wedding ring so that the past away would still be with them on their special day. For people who couldn’t visit their loved ones before their death because of Covid restrictions, the cremation diamonds are helping them cope with the loss. By wearing memorial diamond jewelry, one can take the departed person to any place of remembrance or regret and speak to the deceased person in conversation with themselves.
With tender moments embedded in the hardest substance in the world, diamonds made from ashes are indestructible memories, which can transform a "treasured" memory into a physical treasure. Although, in the end, it is always up to the person's loved ones to keep his or her memory alive, having a cremation diamond allows us to keep the memories aside as our most treasured possessions.
