confusion with place to put money in diamond

[lilyeternity]

Hello everyone out there - we are really confused where to place our money in regards to a diamond.

We have $22 000.00 US to spend - HELP

Cut - Is it much better to have an ideal cut rather than very good?
Colour - I thought that it had to be E/F - saw a G last night that looked good
Clairity - VS1/VS2/SI1 - saw a stone that was vs2 and looked flawless
Carat - bigger rather than smaller - 1.8 to 2.2
Essentially we are not looking to sell the diamond - I would like a beautiful diamond. That is around 2 carats.
What concessions do you think I should make - should it be cut or clairity or colour. How do I get the biggest bang for the buck??

Thanks

 

[lilyeternity]

Please give your opinions !!!!!

 

[dtexan]

I would give priority to cut, color, clarity (not that this is less important but as long as i cannot see the inclusions, it''s fine). I would probably go for a 2 ct g/h, VS2-SI-1 and use what''s left for the setting. My budget was slightly under yours and i ended up buying a I-SI-2 Eighternity diamond. I paid a bit of a premium because it was an Eighternity but the ideal proportions and sparkle more than make up for the color/clarity. The I color faces up white. I would normally not choose a SI-2 but i was told how beautiful it was by the vendor and the inclusions are not at all visible. They were right. Best part is that if i decide to ever change it for a better clarity, color i can do so and get full amt. of what i paid towards a new diamond. Can''t beat that

 

[windowshopper]

i would go with an excellent /excellent, F or G, vs2/VS1................

IMO Ideal is overkill, anything over F is unneccesary/overkill and in a brilliant cut stone you cant really see inclusions of the normal tiny sort so vs is fine--and you have a nice big stone without paying extra for stuff no one sees

 

[Cath]

Date: 1/25/2005 10:42:16 AM
Author: Avantika
I would give priority to cut, color, clarity (not that this is less important but as long as i cannot see the inclusions, it''s fine). I would probably go for a 2 ct g/h, VS2-SI-1 and use what''s left for the setting.

I would do exactly the same. For example, here is an H SI1 from Nice Ice that is $18.4K:
http://www.niceice.com/certcopies/gia13170972/index.htm

 

[valeria101]

With the ocasion of their cut research, GIA run a survey on how much visual effect their grades have... the conclusion is the table below (cited from te Pricescope Diamond Journal here).

This doesn''t take brilliance into account, and that''s what tells diamonds apart from glass

IMO.

 

[Paul-Antwerp]

Date: 1/25/2005 10:45:42 AM
Author: windowshopper
i would go with an excellent /excellent, F or G, vs2/VS1................

IMO Ideal is overkill, anything over F is unneccesary/overkill and in a brilliant cut stone you cant really see inclusions of the normal tiny sort so vs is fine--and you have a nice big stone without paying extra for stuff no one sees

This is very bad advice.

Excellent/excellent is a GIA-grade, and as we all know, this refers only to ''polish'' and ''point-meet-symmetry''. This says absolutely nothing about cut-quality. Advising this as the top is madness. This could just as well be AGS-0 as AGS-10.

A good advice should be to check out for yourself how important cut-quality is for you. It is clear that cut is the most important factor in a diamond''s beauty, but you have to decide for yourself where you put your minimum limit.

Live long,

 

[codex57]

Personally, I like cut. I shoot for Ideal cut altho I will take a look at Very Good cuts that are just slightly off the ideal standard.

Carat size is a close second. I prefer to get the biggest I can that''s ideal cut cuz size is what people who don''t know anything about diamonds notice first.

Color comes next. Since my girl and I both like solitaires, you can see the bottom of the stones usually. So, color matters b/c if a stone is yellowish, you can see it more in a solitaire setting. If you''re spending over $10K, personally, that''s so much money, I like the psychological factor of having a "colorless" diamond.

Clarity is definitely the least important in my eyes. To me VS2 is a safe bet for being eye clean. I''d take a look at SI1''s also, but VS2 just sounds better and takes less work finding an eye clean one.

To me, if you''re spending into the 5 digit range, I figure someone is gonna ask about the specs. So, I lean towards the higher grades (like F color, or VS2) simply for the psychological reason of being able to say you have the higher grade. Plus, carat size starts to have deminishing returns on visual impact after a certain size. That''s in the eye of the beholder of course (and often has to do w/ the ring size your girl wears) so it''s one of those things where you need to actually see the stone in person.

One trick I did was to put the stones I was thinking about on my finger. Then I''d mark my finger or just take a look at distinguishing features on my finger to memorize how big the size of the stone was. Later, I''d take my girl''s hand for whatever reason and look at hers and try and imagine how the size would look on her hand (that''s if you''re still trying to keep things secret). Eventually, I caved and told her more details and then I just straight drew approx sizes of the stones and put them over her hand to see instead of being so sneaky.