EvilSmoothie
Rough_Rock
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2021
- Messages
- 28
Hello PriceScope - I'm new here and I'll apologise in advance - Before today I'd never looked at Diamonds/Engagement Rings and so I'm a total beginner at this.
TL;DR (Sorry, It is too long and I've realised people will probably not bother reading it all!) - I've spent an age looking at an ideal range of specs to search for down to the proportions. How do I find that diamond with "fire" once you've put the numbers in and still have a catalogue to search though
I have spent all day looking at Rings. This morning went to some local jewellery stores (I live in a small town so I'm talking very mainstream high street brands along with one small independently owned store) and looked at some designs. I was totally underwhelmed by the staff at all of them in terms of knowledge of Diamonds. They simply wanted to show me a design to order and it came how it came. I brought up that I am trying to understand how to find a good diamond but the best I could do was - "This window has beautiful rings". The independent had lovely staff but again it was simply a case of this one looks nice but couldn't tell me anything about the Diamond other than a couple of things written on the tag. - No certificate available.
No bother - I'll take to the internet I thought. A few hours reading reddit, some forums and online guides and I'll be a pro in no time. Hell, may even order online at one of the many online stores that promise it will be beautiful. So I look online and keep reading about finding one with the "fire" - I got excited about finding a real beauty and could laugh at my friends who went to the high street stores.
I've been going between Reddit, here, YouTube and some guides on various website and I feel totally overwhelmed by it all. I mean I've made some progress - No Longer am I thinking that I must buy a FL D diamond to get something nice. Phew! (I genuinely at one point did have a ring in a cart with a stone graded IF D thinking I had this nailed).
I plan to visit to a big city (London or Birmingham) to visit some jewellery quarters and hopefully find something that I like or find that I can entrust a jewellery store.
However this is where my mind is starting to frazzle a little:
- Size - Alright, I looked at some in the store and the OH sent me a Halo ring she liked. The store had a 0.4ct with the Halo around it and it looked a decent size but I can afford to go bigger (I think). I'm hesitant to go too much bigger because my OH is petite and doesn't generally wear in your face flashy jewellery. If I end up going for a stone I'll probably want a bigger one. I'll look between 0.7 - 1ct. (I'm aware that there is no direct translation on ct > size but it's a start).
- Colour wise, D,E,F are ideal. G, H, I could all be absolutely fine when trying to get the right price.
- VS2 and upwards should all produce a stone which are clean to the eye. SI1 may well be fine but need to well checked as may shown imperfections.
- cut, cut, cut - This is super important and will trump clarity & colour all day long. (Great - I'll just set it to excellent along with Polish and symmetry).
- Proportions - Going back to the cut this is going to be really important in finding a diamond that will really sparkle and have the fire I keep hearing about. Nailed it, I thought. Found a website with a list of ideal proportions. to search for - as found on this site.
Alright, So now I know what to look for - I just need to find out. I discovered a few websites - 77 diamonds and Bluenile UK have some pretty awesome search functions in. I found some American based ones too but now I'm getting super nervous about getting stung with duty on import and I don't even want to think about the process for having to return something back to the USA.
Still - I can search on all of the above and get presented with a huge list of Diamonds. It turns out that even with all the criteria I can still buy something that's not very good. I've seen people posting "How's this?". I don't want to clog up forums with loads of these until I happen to stumble on the right one.
Finally - I found the HCA - Well this will be my safety net and if I chuck the values in there I'll know it's good. - Nope, turns out that's not the case. Firstly I only get 3 free goes before I have to pay to use it (when my list is never ending). On top of that It may well remove some terrible stones but won't necessarily tell me it's a good one.
So my question is: Where do I go now? How do I find that special diamond, or even how do I find some worthy of posting and asking for advice? The pictures don't mean much to me at all.
I thought I had found a science to find a great Diamond. Maybe I'm overthinking all of this for a diamond for the size I'm looking for. Should I even be putting myself through all this?
I've just realised that this is an awfully long post just to say that I don't know what I'm doing. My problem is when making any big purchase I generally research and try and find the best I can afford, but normally can set it down do a model number or something. This is so far from being able to do that.
Any help or guidance would be appreciated.
TL;DR (Sorry, It is too long and I've realised people will probably not bother reading it all!) - I've spent an age looking at an ideal range of specs to search for down to the proportions. How do I find that diamond with "fire" once you've put the numbers in and still have a catalogue to search though
I have spent all day looking at Rings. This morning went to some local jewellery stores (I live in a small town so I'm talking very mainstream high street brands along with one small independently owned store) and looked at some designs. I was totally underwhelmed by the staff at all of them in terms of knowledge of Diamonds. They simply wanted to show me a design to order and it came how it came. I brought up that I am trying to understand how to find a good diamond but the best I could do was - "This window has beautiful rings". The independent had lovely staff but again it was simply a case of this one looks nice but couldn't tell me anything about the Diamond other than a couple of things written on the tag. - No certificate available.
No bother - I'll take to the internet I thought. A few hours reading reddit, some forums and online guides and I'll be a pro in no time. Hell, may even order online at one of the many online stores that promise it will be beautiful. So I look online and keep reading about finding one with the "fire" - I got excited about finding a real beauty and could laugh at my friends who went to the high street stores.
I've been going between Reddit, here, YouTube and some guides on various website and I feel totally overwhelmed by it all. I mean I've made some progress - No Longer am I thinking that I must buy a FL D diamond to get something nice. Phew! (I genuinely at one point did have a ring in a cart with a stone graded IF D thinking I had this nailed).
I plan to visit to a big city (London or Birmingham) to visit some jewellery quarters and hopefully find something that I like or find that I can entrust a jewellery store.
However this is where my mind is starting to frazzle a little:
- Size - Alright, I looked at some in the store and the OH sent me a Halo ring she liked. The store had a 0.4ct with the Halo around it and it looked a decent size but I can afford to go bigger (I think). I'm hesitant to go too much bigger because my OH is petite and doesn't generally wear in your face flashy jewellery. If I end up going for a stone I'll probably want a bigger one. I'll look between 0.7 - 1ct. (I'm aware that there is no direct translation on ct > size but it's a start).
- Colour wise, D,E,F are ideal. G, H, I could all be absolutely fine when trying to get the right price.
- VS2 and upwards should all produce a stone which are clean to the eye. SI1 may well be fine but need to well checked as may shown imperfections.
- cut, cut, cut - This is super important and will trump clarity & colour all day long. (Great - I'll just set it to excellent along with Polish and symmetry).
- Proportions - Going back to the cut this is going to be really important in finding a diamond that will really sparkle and have the fire I keep hearing about. Nailed it, I thought. Found a website with a list of ideal proportions. to search for - as found on this site.
Alright, So now I know what to look for - I just need to find out. I discovered a few websites - 77 diamonds and Bluenile UK have some pretty awesome search functions in. I found some American based ones too but now I'm getting super nervous about getting stung with duty on import and I don't even want to think about the process for having to return something back to the USA.
Still - I can search on all of the above and get presented with a huge list of Diamonds. It turns out that even with all the criteria I can still buy something that's not very good. I've seen people posting "How's this?". I don't want to clog up forums with loads of these until I happen to stumble on the right one.
Finally - I found the HCA - Well this will be my safety net and if I chuck the values in there I'll know it's good. - Nope, turns out that's not the case. Firstly I only get 3 free goes before I have to pay to use it (when my list is never ending). On top of that It may well remove some terrible stones but won't necessarily tell me it's a good one.
So my question is: Where do I go now? How do I find that special diamond, or even how do I find some worthy of posting and asking for advice? The pictures don't mean much to me at all.
I thought I had found a science to find a great Diamond. Maybe I'm overthinking all of this for a diamond for the size I'm looking for. Should I even be putting myself through all this?
I've just realised that this is an awfully long post just to say that I don't know what I'm doing. My problem is when making any big purchase I generally research and try and find the best I can afford, but normally can set it down do a model number or something. This is so far from being able to do that.
Any help or guidance would be appreciated.
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