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The trend is growing among younger customers, who see synthetic stones as a cost-effective alternative to natural gems.
Marilyn Monroe once famously sang, “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend,” and that sentiment still appears to hold true — even if the diamonds aren’t real. Lab-grown diamonds, or synthetic diamonds grown in a lab setting, are becoming much more popular among young people in search of an environmentally and economically friendly alternative to organic gems.
Fifth Avenue-based jeweler Liori Diamonds, which has a store in Sunny Isles, sells both the natural and lab-grown variety. “They’re optically the same, and they are chemically exactly the same,” says Jesse de Leon, one of Liori Diamonds’ founders.
“It’s like going to the top of the mountain to fetch some ice, as opposed to going to your freezer to get some ice. That’s really the difference — that you find one naturally and the other closer to home, but it’s the same exact genetic makeup.” De Leon says the store sees “tremendous demand” for lab-grown diamonds across age groups and financial tiers. Part of that is due to broader knowledge about the human costs of diamond mining.
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