You may have wondered about how Zircon varies from Cubic zirconia as they both look identical. Let’s plunge into the dimensions and facets of these crystals on the road to discovering their wonderful world.
Zircon
Zircon is a natural gemstone, and it is not lab-created, whereas Cubic Zirconia is lab-created. The former is an ancient crystal whose first specimen was found in Australia and is billions of years old.
Cubic Zirconia
In contrast to Zircon, Zirconia or Cubic Zirconia is a fresh mate first created in a lab in 1930. However, it became commercially saleable in the 1970s after conducting several experiments on it.
Chemical Properties of Zircon & Zirconia
If you are eager to know the chemical properties of these crystals, let me tell you that Zircon is created by mother nature as zirconium silicate. On the contrary, Cubic Zirconia is synthesized in the labs or manufacturing units. And zirconium oxide by chemists if they intend to sell on a large scale. The former is rare, and therefore it is more expensive, and the latter is synthetic; consequently, it is cheaper than Natural Zircon.
Like the other customers, you may be concerned about the hardness of zircon and cubic zirconia as it depicts its scratch resisting trait. Both of these stones are less hard than diamonds. Of course, however, on the Mohs scale, Zircon is more complex, scoring an 8.5 and cubic zirconia at 7.5. There is a slight difference between the two. Are these crystals prone to scratches? Yes, they are, but if you care for them, like polishing them with a soft and silky piece of cloth, taking your jewelry off at bedtime, these crystals should last and maintain their dazzle and sparkle over five long years.
Care for Zircon/Cubic Zirconia
Whether to wear Zircon jewelry in the shower, the experts suggest that you should not wear it under showers as it will be under quite moist conditions and will gradually decrease the life of your jewel.
Do these crystals show fire or dispersion? The answer is yes, both do. For those who don’t know about the term dispersion, it means the refraction of light as it passes through your crystal. It reveals other colors and hues as you move these against the light. Zircons and Zirconia will usually demonstrate a pretty sparkly light show on you as it has quite the same dispersion properties as diamonds. Furthermore, zircons and Zirconia have double refraction of light, which is 2x than diamonds; you will fall in love with these at first sight and by holding them under a fairly lit room.
Interestingly Zircon is commercially available as blue Zircon, hot pinkish hue zircon, yellow-hued Zircon, etc. However, people mostly prefer colorless Zirconia with transparent matter. Treating these crystals with different degrees of heat can change or dissolve their color.
Rhodium-Plating
If you are concerned about any skin reactions due to wearing Zircon or Zirconia, then be assured, it doesn’t trigger any. However, the other metal frame in which it is embedded may do so. That’s why plating metals is so important. Our website Galore offers Rhodium plating in most of its jewelry which prevents discoloration of you or your loved one’s skin.
If you are curious, if Zirconia and zircons are the same as Swarovsky crystals, they look almost similar if we consider only the appearance. However, Swarovsky crystals are a brand heavier on the pocket, whereas Zirconia is cheaper, but the quality differs.
It is a fact that lab-created Zirconia is prone to heat as it is a thermal insulator. Whereas a diamond is a thermal conductor. It means a diamond will heat up, and a zirconia gem won’t!
Caution!
Zirconia may melt or burnt-out under extreme heat. So it is better to put your Zirconia laced jewelry away from fire and cooking range.
A diamond will sink quickly in water, and so will its simulant zircon as both of these are dense. Moreover, the imitations and fake pieces will sink very slowly or even float on the water’s surface. It is one of the tests you may perform to check the originality of your crystals if you’ve got spare Zirconia or zircon pieces.
On a final note, I would say that you may choose to buy any of Zirconia-embedded jewelry from our website Galore. As the apparent properties are similar, the price range is more affordable than diamonds. It will ultimately enhance your beauty worthy of praise!