Hi everyone. I''ve been lurking the boards for a few months as I have gone through the engagement ring shopping process. At first I was going to pick out the diamond/setting, and my fiance to be wanted nothing to do with the process. She would show me pictures from magazines of her likes and dislikes. I realized I was in over my head. The ones she liked looked the same as the ones she hated. So finally we went shopping together and hit just about every jewelery store within a 45 minute drive. By the end, all the rings started to look the same. Anyway, one thing that she always kept comming back to was a feature that she had seen on a Verragio ring. On the particular Verragio setting that she liked, the center stone was mounted above channel set side stones. The side stones didn''t stop and continued all the way under the diamond. We couldn''t find anything similar to that locally. The Verragio was a little out of my price range, as it wouldn''t have allowed me to buy the center stone that I was aiming for (we had been looking at high quality but not ideal cut .75ish carat stones). At our last stop (Jared''s) she spotted a pre-packaged 14k white gold ring that had the one feature she liked (side stones under center stone). By pre-packaged I mean the side stones and center stone was already set, and you could choose the "model" you wanted by the total carat weight. I had always been suggesting quality over quantity, and this ring''s quality was way less than what I wanted (alot cheaper than our budget as well). I had also been pushing platinum due to her nickel allergy. Anyway, to make a long story slightly shorter, we came to a "compromise" and had the ring remade in 18k white gold with diamonds to our specifications. I picked it up yesterday and was absoutely amazed at the difference. Night and day.....my jaw hit the floor. I compared the custom job to the premade setup, and let me tell you...cut makes all the difference in the world. I wasn''t planning on posting, but I''m so thrilled with the final product I couldn''t resist. I don''t have a clue how to get the diamond sparke that is visible in alot of the pics, but here is the design.
The center stone is an 0.55 carat AGS0 H color, VVS2 clarity. The sidestones are 5 points each and are H color/VS1 clarity.