You've heard the phrase ‘diamonds are a girl's best friend’ - but now, her best friend can be a diamond. Cremated remains of the deceased are being transformed into diamonds for the living to remember and memorialize their loved ones.

After Barbara Macknick's husband passed away in November, 2002, she decided to have his remains made into a small yellow diamond.

Macknick said she heard about the hi-tech process on the radio. "As soon as I heard it, I knew that it was something I wanted to do", Macknick said. She admits thinking about how others would perceive her diamond.

"I thought maybe it would kind of creep people out, you know...she's wearing remains. But I haven't had that reaction not even once."

Macknick got her diamond from Life Gems, an Illinois-based company. Life Gems uses a process that extracts carbon from cremated remains of people and pets. The carbon is heated to extremely high temperatures then another process converts the carbon to graphite.

The graphite is then placed in a diamond press, where the material is heated and pressurized. After that, a manufactured diamond is born.

These manufactured diamonds are considered real diamonds and are said to be identical to natural diamonds. Prices for these diamonds range in price from $3,000 to nearly $20,000 (USD). The prices vary depending on size and color of the diamond desired.

Diamonds are inspected and graded, by gemologists. The entire process takes approximately 24 weeks.

An emotional Macknick said of her diamond, "it's a whole composite. It's a totality of a personality. It's very nice to have, I have to admit that. It's very nice to have."

Forget ashes to ashes - this is a new way of keeping those you treasure...as treasure. But be careful, this alchemy in the afterlife will have your spouse hanging round your neck for a while longer.

The article above was found on Google and was published originally on TIMESNOW.TV