Lab-Grown Melee: Sizes, Grades and How Jewellers Order It
Melee is the small stuff that makes a halo, a pavé band or an eternity ring sparkle. How to specify, order and check lab-grown melee, with a size-to-weight table.
Melee is the trade's name for small diamonds, usually below about a fifth of a carat each: the stones that line a halo, pave a band, run around an eternity ring or fill a cluster. For many jewellers it is the first lab-grown product they buy, because it turns designs that would be costly with natural melee into something customers can afford. Ordering it well comes down to three things: the right size, a sensible grade band and consistent matching.
How melee sizes are described
Melee is sorted by passing stones through sieve plates with holes of set sizes, so suppliers quote sieve ranges (for example +2 to +2.5) as well as millimetre diameters for round stones. Sieve numbering is not identical in every sieve set, so the safest common language is millimetres: tell your supplier the exact range your settings take, such as 1.30–1.35 mm, and ask for the sieve range they will pick from.
Weight follows diameter closely, because a well-cut round brilliant has fixed proportions. The table below gives the rule-of-thumb weights we use when planning a design.
Grade bands, not single grades
Individual melee stones are too small to grade one by one, so they are sold in colour and clarity bands. The common lab-grown bands are:
| Band | What it looks like | Where it fits |
|---|---|---|
| DEF · VVS–VS | Icy white, clean under a loupe | High-end bridal, white gold and platinum-coloured settings |
| EFG · VS–SI | White face-up, small inclusions under magnification | Most bridal and fine jewellery; the best value band |
| GH · SI | Near-white, fine in yellow gold | Price-led fashion jewellery |
Because melee sits beside a centre stone, match the band to the centre: E–F melee around a G centre stone can make the centre look slightly warmer.
Full cut or single cut
A full-cut round brilliant has 57 or 58 facets, like a centre stone. A single cut has about 17. Below roughly 1 mm, single cuts are still used for some vintage-style work, but most lab-grown melee today is full cut, which gives more sparkle. Specify which you want; mixing them in one piece looks uneven.
Matching matters more than the top grade
A halo only looks right if every stone has the same colour, the same make and the same diameter. Ask your supplier how parcels are sorted and what size tolerance they work to, and keep a note of each parcel's grade and size so a repeat order can be matched to the last one. For multi-row pavé, a slightly lower but consistent band beats a higher grade that varies.
Fancy-shape melee
Baguettes, tapered baguettes, princess cuts, marquises, pears and trillions bring structure to modern designs: a baguette shoulder, a marquise cluster, a trillion side stone. Fancy shapes vary more than rounds, so give length and width in millimetres and, if possible, send the CAD file or a setting.
Checks on arrival
- Weigh the parcel and compare it with the invoice.
- Measure a sample of stones with a gauge or callipers.
- Look at a spread under a daylight lamp against white paper: colour should be even.
- Check a sample under a 10× loupe for chips and obvious inclusions.
- Set a few stones in metal before committing the whole parcel to production.
Your invoice should describe the goods as laboratory-grown diamonds, with total carat weight, size range and grade band. Melee is not usually certified stone by stone; larger stones, typically from about 0.30 ct, can come with individual IGI reports.
Lab-grown melee and natural parcels
If you also buy natural melee, keep the two apart in your workshop and on your stock records, and have natural parcels screened. Instruments such as GIA's iD100 and De Beers' AMS2 are made to pick out laboratory-grown stones in natural melee. For lab-grown pieces, the important thing is honest description to your customer: the stones are laboratory-grown diamonds, and the paperwork says so.
Melee at work: eternity bands from our workshop
Buying melee from us
Sheladiya Diamond, the family business behind Zarna Jewels, cuts and polishes CVD diamonds in Surat, from melee to centre stones. Registered businesses can browse loose stones, request holds and order through Zarna B2B, or contact our team with sizes, grade bands and quantities for a parcel quote. Read more about the platform in our Zarna B2B introduction.
What size is a melee diamond?
There is no single cut-off, but the trade usually calls round stones up to about 0.18–0.20 ct melee; that is roughly up to 3.8 mm in diameter.
How many 1.5 mm diamonds are in a carat?
About 65, since each weighs roughly 0.015 ct. The exact number depends on the stones' proportions.
Should I buy melee by sieve size or millimetres?
Give millimetres for your settings and let the supplier confirm the sieve range. Sieve numbers can differ between sieve sets; millimetres do not.
Is lab-grown melee certified?
Not stone by stone. The invoice describes the parcel; larger stones come with individual reports.
