| Aron Weingarten brings the yellow diamond up to | | | | Weingarten shifts uncomfortably in his chair and |
| the stainless steel jeweler's loupe he holds against | | | | stares at the glittering gems on his dining room |
| his eye. We are in Antwerp, Belgium, in | | | | table. "Unless they can be detected," he says, |
| Weingarten's marbled and gilded living room on the | | | | "these stones will bankrupt the industry." |
| edge of the city's gem district, the center of the | | | | Put pure carbon under enough heat and pressure |
| diamond universe. | | | | - say, 2,200 degrees Fahrenheit and 50,000 |
| Nearly 80 percent of the world's rough and | | | | atmospheres - and it will crystallize into the |
| polished diamonds move through the hands of | | | | hardest material known. Those were the |
| Belgian gem traders like Weingarten, a dealer who | | | | conditions that first forged diamonds deep in |
| wears the thick beard and black suit of the | | | | Earth's mantle 3.3 billion years ago. |
| Hasidim. | | | | Replicating that environment in a lab isn't easy, but |
| "This is very rare stone," he says, almost to | | | | that hasn't kept dreamers from trying. Since the |
| himself, in thickly accented English. "Yellow | | | | mid-19th century, dozens of these modern |
| diamonds of this color are very hard to find. It is | | | | alchemists have been injured in accidents and |
| probably worth 10, maybe 15 thousand dollars." | | | | explosions while attempting to manufacture |
| "I have two more exactly like it in my pocket," I | | | | diamonds. |
| tell him. | | | | Recent decades have seen some modest |
| He puts the diamond down and looks at me | | | | successes. Starting in the 1950s, engineers |
| seriously for the first time. I place the other two | | | | managed to produce tiny crystals for industrial |
| stones on the table. They are all the same color | | | | purposes - to coat saws, drill bits, and grinding |
| and size. To find three nearly identical yellow | | | | wheels. |
| diamonds is like flipping a coin 10,000 times and | | | | But this summer, the first wave of gem-quality |
| never seeing tails. | | | | manufactured diamonds began to hit the market. |
| "These are cubic zirconium?" Weingarten says | | | | They are grown in a warehouse in Florida by a |
| without much hope. | | | | roomful of Russian-designed machines spitting out |
| "No, they're real," I tell him. "But they were made | | | | 3-carat roughs 24 hours a day, seven days a |
| by a machine in Florida for less than a hundred | | | | week. |
| dollars." | | | | |