CUT

Shape and placement of facets

These details are not required for students of EPS2.

Surprising variations in table size are the most obvious 'cut' characteristic:

• The size of the table determines affects the appearance of the stone - the bigger the table, greater the brilliance (the sparkle) and less the fire (the variety and intensity of the color reflected)
• The smaller the table, the greater the fire and smaller the brilliance. It is more wasteful to cut the rough diamonds to have smaller tables, thus diamonds with smaller tables are rarer (some suggestions involve the ideal table width to be 53% of the diameter of the stone, others suggest 56% or 57.5%. Appraising guidelines penalize diamonds with tables above 64% pretty severely, but you see tables all the way into 70 % range.)