Quality questions, 1/3 t.w. princess studs

[shawnocean]

Hi!,

I have been lurking here for a week or so and have enjoyed these forums very much. Everyone here is very enthusiastic and all the posts are very detailed and well thought out. I also had a good time reading a thread from someone who worked at the shane company going back and forth with everyone, very funny stuff.

Anyhow, my wife is turning 30 at the end of may and has hinted at some diamond earrings, looking at the fake ones she has now I have pretty much settled on 1/3 carat t.w. princess cut white gold studs. The 1/4 seemed pretty small and the 1/2 is a bit of a jump price wise for me now and she has a 1/3 carat ering if that matters and she''s smaller with smaller ears. From reading the posts about earrings I garnered that with earrings si1 - i1 clarity g - j color are a good balance between price and quality. And I''ve read lots here about cut being probably the most important, so I am hoping you all can let me know if I am on the right track and check out these two sets I am considering, or offer others for everyday wear.

The cut quality for princess cut has been hard for me to compare from one website or store to another but the first one here is rated, by them, very good cut with si2 g-i, and the second is rated excellent cut but maybe with excess quality (if there is such a thing ) VS2 g-h, for a 100 dollar difference.

http://www.diamondstudsonly.com/detail.cfm?sku=33PR_G-I_SI2_WG4PFB

http://www.diamondstudsonly.com/detail.cfm?sku=33PR_G-H_VS2_WG4PFB

Oh, one other thing, do you all hear a lot about allergies to nickel in white gold or is that pretty rare?
Thanks for your help!
Shawn

 

[valeria101]

As far as I know, allergies to WG are fairly rare (not proportional to the number of times these are mentioned to promote platinum, LOL). If you have not tried WG before, no way to know if this is relevant for you or not though

I know I can''t wear silver earrings more than a couple of hours or else. WG is fine, but I think the one pair of earrings is palladium white gold - an allow w/o nickel.


About the diamonds...

#1. the seller uses the same picture for both pairs - so obviously the images are of no help choosing between the two options.

#2. my experience with smaller princess cuts is not happy: most are terribly dull! Too bad, because well cut ones look very cute... How about rounds?

#3. I''d steer away from SI in this size because the stones are never graded and more often than not whatever is called ''SI'' clarity below 30 pts... barely lets the light pass through

Would definitely not expect conservative grades there!

#4. Color... small size shows it less, so I would not expect to see any of it until well below ''I'' (more like K!). However, the previous observation about grading for small diamonds in commercial jewelry applies - IMO, unless the seller calls it ''colorless'' I start wondering what on earth are they trying to say (usually unrelated with GIA grades).

All in all, I would be less leery about such a pair labeled "I/VS'' than ''G/SI2''.

Obviously this sounds quite pessimistic, and in part.. this is because I do not know anything about the seller. In general, I would start with the above considerations and let the good looks and quality of the merchandise demonstrate the contrary

 

[Sundial]

Have you looked at Whiteflash? They have Expert Selection Ready Set to Go princess cut studs .30 ct. tw. for $298.00 that are H SI. I''ve never bought from them myself, but based on what I''ve read here on pricescope I would feel more comfortable ordering from them as far as getting well cut stones that will be more sparkly.

 

[Rod]

Date: 4/11/2006 9:54:33 AM
Author: Sundial
Have you looked at Whiteflash? They have Expert Selection Ready Set to Go princess cut studs .30 ct. tw. for $298.00 that are H SI. I''ve never bought from them myself, but based on what I''ve read here on pricescope I would feel more comfortable ordering from them as far as getting well cut stones that will be more sparkly.

I ditto Sundial''s recommendation. I''ve never bought from them either, but my next purchase will likely come from them. They are highly respected here and their Ready Set earrings seem like great values.

Ana makes good points about princess cuts. Are you locked into princess? You might get a bit more flash from a nice pair of rounds.

Sounds like a wonderful 30th birthday gift!!

I''d give Whiteflash a call.

Good Luck!

 

[klavigne]

Thats a real nice size for everyday wear. But I''d have to agree with everyone else, if she doesn''t have a preference one way or the other go with the rounds. Check out Whiteflash and goodoldgold. They''ll probable beat those prices and they will most likely beat their quality as well.

 

[shawnocean]

wow, thanks for all your responces, valeria especially.

she is pretty well uh set on princess cut, I am going to check on whiteflash and good old gold too.

alot of the advice I read about I1 and SI2 being the way to go for earrings must have been for larger stones that are graded more accurately is what I am hearing from you valeria, thanks for all the tips, I would appreciate any others about smaller earrings, like when a merchant doesn''t list anything about cut quality, should I make any assumptions or are some merchants just known to always have excellent cut even in lower graded stones? I read something on the site that I was looking at that thier vs2 with thier exellent cut can be seen sparkling from across a darkened room, that sounds pretty exciting!

 

[jaz464]

I would not take anything for granted and don't make any assumptions. If a diamond's quality is not listed, my guess is that it is mediocre, at best.

Vendors will surely want to advertise the quality of their stones, if it is very good.

 

[Maya Moonstone]

Hi Shawn

I bought a pair of diamond studs from Whiteflash last week Thursday. I will be picking them up this afternoon. Superfast Service with a Smile! (My birthday is also in May - and then is when I will get them after my peek at the pair today)

I opted for choosing two diamonds from their inventory on their website because I would like to upgrade my earrings in the future. Wf only allow upgrades for stones that have a grading report from a recognized lab and was bought from them (read their upgrade policy on their website). I bought two diamonds that are 0.33 ct each and which has a AGS certificate.

The WF Expert Selection Ready Set Go pairs of diamond studs are a great deal. The stones are selected by WF and you can be assured that what they say it is, is what it is. You can find them here: WhiteFlash Diamond Studs

I did do some research before I bought from WF. They had the best prices of all the online vendors for what I was looking for. Most of the B&M stores however were more expensive and willtell you that the cut of their stones are great, but they have no proof of that since they do not usually submit stones smaller than 0.5ct to a recognised grading lab like AGS or GIA.

A lot of PS members have the WF Expert Selection Ready sets. I would highly recommend them.

Maya

 

[shawnocean]

Thanks again folks, I love that picture jazmine, cool framing, thanks again for the tips, I am still mulling it all over, the whiteflash ready to go sets look great, I wish they mentioned something about the cut quality, might have to email them, from what I''ve read princess cut stones do not have as easy a system for the quality of the cut as round stones to compare? no ideal cut in princess?

 

[JulieN]

http://www.jamesallen.com/item.asp?cid=76&jewelry=1&item=508 G/H, VS2/SI1

 

[MissAva]

WF Princess Cut Studs The half carat here are 130$ less then on JA...Oh and I think that ES is what WF is saying about the cut quality.

 

[JulieN]

Oh, I didn''t even know WF had ready-set princess studs. cool!

 

[Garry H (Cut Nut)]

Tip - dont buy small princess cuts - under 1/2ct each they really seriously under perform rounds.

Maybe you can have something round in a aquare shaped setting - then you can have the look and the sprkle.