What is a diamond breathing hole?

It is not true that natural diamonds need to breathe or need extra air for storage.

There are several reasons behind this and include how diamonds are formed.

Why Do Diamonds Need To Breathe? (Or Not?)

Breathing & Storage

There are countless diverse types of gems.

When you consider natural diamonds, they do not need a special gem aerator to breathe.

Unlike other types of gemstones, diamonds are as tough as they get.

Natural diamonds can have a toughness rating from good to exceptional.

Additionally, they can withstand distinct types of enhancements.

Two of the special enhancements that are coming for diamonds include laser drilling, bleaching, or special coatings.

There are other reasons why natural diamonds do not need explicitly special storage for extra breathing room.

Heavily Resilient

Diamonds are heavily resilient.

Even their name expresses how resilient they are.

The word diamond comes from Greek origins (ἀδάμας or adámas in Greek means adamant).

Natural diamonds of the hardest materials on the entire globe (stronger than familiar metals like titanium), and the term diamond signifies the words invincible and indestructible.

Due to their chemical makeup and strength, diamonds do not need exceptional care as far as having extra air to breathe.

This is because natural diamonds are non-porous, semi-precious, and easier to care for when compared to other treated gemstone types.

Unlike their porous gemstone counterparts, diamonds can be merely cleaned with some basic jewelry cleaner or soapy water that is warm.

Also, It is incredibly important to make sure that your diamonds are thoroughly rinsed after they have been cleaned.

You can clean diamonds this way because they don’t absorb the water like a porous stone, a gemstone that has been treated, or some lab-generated stones.

So, contrary to belief, the value of a diamond lasts for a long time despite being stored at close quarters.

The value will be at its premium if the stones have not been chipped or scratched.

Also, a diamond does not need air to breathe because a diamond will not dry out like a porous stone.

Porous gemstones do not always require the same type of care but can be more complicated.

There are many reasons that people have asked questions like, “why do diamonds need to breathe?”

The holes that are found behind a band of a ring or pendant with diamonds are there as a setting.

A wonderful image of this is a traditional or modern paved setting.

There are other settings. They consist of the subsequent common diamond settings:

Depending on the design of the jewelry made with diamonds, the setting will serve several purposes.

The first purpose is to set the diamonds into the jewelry setting itself.

The second reason for this is ongoing jewelry and diamond maintenance.

The holes make it easier for the owner or professional to clean jewelry that has natural diamonds.

What’s more is, depending on where you are in the world and the temperature of your environment, the purpose of the holes is to allow moisture to leave the jewelry without pooling within the ring or pendant itself.

Lastly, instead of the holes being a purpose for breathing, it allows an eminence of light to hit the diamonds to create more brilliance.

This is what creates a more sparkly effect when you see natural diamonds under various levels of light.

Also, the holes that you see on the back of your ring on the band or pendant are called azures in English.

The French derivative of this term is adjoure or ajour.

Azures

If you look at the back of your ring’s band, you may see quite a few holes called azures.

The term azure means there is one hole and azures pertaining to more than one cutout hole.

So, what exactly are azures?

Azures are a cut-out on the back of your ring or pendant that has diamonds.

This can apply to other jewelry pieces with diamond settings as well.

The azure is a designed countersunk or setting that is cut out of a band or other diamond jewelry.

Today, it is common to see round or circle-shaped azures.

However, they can be lots of other shapes too. Other shapes include triangles, squares, and rectangles.

Utilizing azure techniques to set diamonds is becoming a lost art due to other manufacturing methods.

This is a reason why more circles or oval-shaped azures are recently seen.

Azures are an element of design that helps the jewelry maker to remove any excess gold, silver, platinum, or other metal.

Currently, it is harder to find “true” azure settings because of the modern methods used to cut diamonds.

Diamond cutting has heavily evolved since the 1920s.

Getting the light to go through the stone to create more brilliance isn’t a real issue anymore.

During the 1900s, the azure technique was an innovative way of creating jewelry with diamonds.

Diamonds Are Made

Lab-created diamonds are made.

Whereas natural diamonds are formed.

This is an important aspect to consider to fully understand why diamonds do not need extra air or room to breathe.

Did you know that diamonds are formed below the earth at around one hundred miles underneath the surface’s upper layer or mantle?

It is there where most of the world’s natural diamonds are formed.

This is an enormously heated section of the planet, and is where the extreme pressures exist, so diamonds can begin and complete their form.

The diamonds that are seen at the near-surface of the earth to be mined have made their journey through volcanic eruptions.

There have not been any Kimberlite-eruptions like this seen in modern times.

However, there have been volcanic eruptions in Hawaii as of 2018.

There were gemstones found called olivine crystals or jewelry quality fine peridot.

With this fact in mind, there are dubbed Kimberlites that are said to exist today.

These are places where a lot of the world’s natural diamonds are said to be sourced today.

This tidbit of information matters because it impacts how we care for and store natural diamonds today.

You might also like:

Do Diamonds need to breathe? Do they need room for air?

YES!

Diamonds inhale (or expand) due to heat, and contract (or shrink) due to cold…

AND …I’M KIDDING!!!

Many customers believe in the Fact that Diamonds need room to Breathe. I’m here to say it’s false!

Diamonds Don’t Breath!

They don’t Expand or Contract due to Temperature, Liquids, Rain or Shine… They are Solid Material (The Most Durable and Hardest Rock Created by Nature), and are able to withstand just about anything that man can throw at it (minus a sledgehammer).

Why do people think that Diamonds need to Breathe? Where does this idea come from?

Air Holes

Often holes are Cut out underneath Diamonds in Mountings or Rings (see image above). So naturally, people assume that the Holes are there to allow the Diamonds Air.

But the Holes are really there to make it Easy to Clean the Diamonds, and to make the Diamonds Easier to Set without Accidentally Chipping the Culet (Pointy Tip of the Diamond). Read more about Holes in your Ring.

Gemstones that DO Breathe!

Pearls on the other hand ARE Organic and need to Breathe and Contract in different Liquids, which also results in them coming Loose and Falling out of the Mounting if you get them too Wet for too long. Read: Why Pearls Come Loose.

The same goes with Turquoise, Opals, Lapis, Malachite, Coral, and Amber. Any gems that are Porous or Organic will need special care (which also means, don’t roll them up in a Tightly Sealed Bag for Storage… they could Dry out!). Also read: What Gems to NOT put in an Ultrasonic Jewelry Cleaner!

But NOT Diamonds!

They don’t Breathe. They need NO AIR!

Just a little TLC and a Good Scrubbing every now and then to Remove the Dirt and built up Crud that stops the Diamond from shinning. Clean them up and Diamonds will always look new again.

Read: 5 Secrets to Cleaning a Diamond

Now there’s a Deep Breath of Relief! :)

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