Travelling to new york to buy an engagement ring

Date: 9/15/2009 6:04:48 AM
Author:Rodney
HI All,

Id appreciate some advise in relation to shopping for diamonds in new york, Im from ireland and i am planing on travelling to new york in oct to buy an engagemnet ring with my girlfriend, she is keen on a three stone platinum. I have priced rings with 1.65c F Vs2 Triple ex 0.75 F Vs2 Triple ex side stones all GIA and found prices in new york much cheaper.

Until coming accross this website i thought it may have been possible to travel for 5 days pick out 3 stones get them mounted and come home safe in the knowledge i had bought a GIA certified stone with triple excellent cut and that the fact it was GIA certifed excellent cut it was going to be the best cut possible.....???Now im not sure,

With GIA Excellent cut grade be cautious as this grade can allow for some less desirable proportion configurations - what we call steep deeps which can lead to light leakage.  So evaluate each diamond carefully on its own desirable physical and visual properties.

You can use this tool to help you find the best GIA Excellents, aim to score below 2 then evaluate with your own eyes and or images such as Idealscope or ASET.

http://www.pricescope.com/cutadviser.asp

http://www.highperformancediamonds.com/index.php?page=education-performance

should i be looking for hearts and arrows specifically as i want the stones to look the best they can. Or should i be just going on measurements rather than jsut GIA telling me the cut is excellent. It seems Hearts and arrows can be harder to come accross and i could be taken advantage of when i would be in a rush to purchase.

H&A results from top optical symmetry, this is not the same as lab graded symmetry which is the grading of how well the physical symmetry of the diamond is crafted, optical symmetry is responsible for h&a patterning and the quality due to overall cut precision.  You don't however need to have a h&a cut to have a beautiful diamond, if the proportions of the diamond are good then that should result in a lively and beautiful diamond.  Also some diamonds show h&a patterning but might not be considered ' true' h&a as the patterns don't meet the required standards, however these diamonds can be well worth considering if you don't want a picture perfect h&a.  Also some diamonds don't have great optical symmetry but do have excellent proportions, so it depends on what you want.

I could buy in tiffanys but they seem way over priced but id at least have some piece of mind
I wonder does anyone have any ideas to help

Thanks
Rodney

Date: 9/15/2009 9:01:21 AM
Author: Rodney
Thanks guys for the replies,

So if i want a stone that looks great i first need to look at the proportions with the holloway cut advisor and if < 2 consider and then get an idealscope image to decide between the remaining stones? Is that generally how it works?

What if they don't have an idealscope image, say if i went to the diamond district......(would most of them there have the same).... would i have to get numberous diamonds independently appraised if they were not available?

Thanks for the help