Pandora II
Ideal_Rock
- Joined
- Aug 3, 2006
- Messages
- 9,613
I thought I''d go to Hatton Garden to get a couple of quotes for a curved plat wedding band with channel-set 2pt melee, while I was there I thought I''d have a look around at the coloured stones on offer.
I spoke to a couple of Sri Lankan dealers. They had some very pretty sapphires and spinels and the cut was pretty decent on them. One admitted that all his stock was heat treated, but he didn''t buy anything with Be or similar - the other swore that his were all natural. Hmmm...
I asked if they had any tsavorites - the first had a stone that was at least 5ct, very nice colour, but a window you could watch TV through! Such a shame. It was $3.5k - I wondered if maybe it would be worth buying and then doing a mega-recut but it looked a bit too shallow to get a big enough stone that would make my $$ back.
The second said he didn''t have any, but I spotted one in his case - labelled "Severite"
- 4ct, slightly over dark colour, but very included and cut wasn''t great. I did have an interesting chat with them about gems in general and got the address of a moonstone mine in the Galle area of Sri Lanka - poor FI is going to be spending a lot of our honeymoon looking at rocks!
I went to Holts - which is the main testing lab in the UK. They had an amazing 1.90ct demantoid and a beautiful 2.21ct sphene that looked like a similar colour to my three - so I had a play putting it next to other colours. I think I''ve decided it looks best all on it''s own!
On the whole I was pretty disappointed with the general quality. The UK public are obviously not discriminating buyers!
I didn''t look at any diamonds - if I want to see them I go to New Bond Street.
Oh yes, every single place I went into they admired my very fine "emerald" - I was pretty concerned when the girl in Holt''s did, but at least the manager who came over knew exactly what it was.
Finally, they wanted $4k +VAT @17.5% for a 2.5mm curved platinum band with 24 channel-set 0.02ct melee. The melee alone were $1.2k for 0.48 tctw. Unbelievable!!! Oh, and only one of the vendors wanted to borrow my e-ring to fit the band to it. I was truly shocked!
That said, I tried on around 30 curved bands and they all fitted extremely well, so I''m going to see if they can use the CAD from my e-ring to make one in the US. At least I know what I''m getting in terms of melee - no-one bothered to ask what colour or clarity I had/wanted - to say nothing of much better customer service!
I spoke to a couple of Sri Lankan dealers. They had some very pretty sapphires and spinels and the cut was pretty decent on them. One admitted that all his stock was heat treated, but he didn''t buy anything with Be or similar - the other swore that his were all natural. Hmmm...
I asked if they had any tsavorites - the first had a stone that was at least 5ct, very nice colour, but a window you could watch TV through! Such a shame. It was $3.5k - I wondered if maybe it would be worth buying and then doing a mega-recut but it looked a bit too shallow to get a big enough stone that would make my $$ back.
The second said he didn''t have any, but I spotted one in his case - labelled "Severite"
I went to Holts - which is the main testing lab in the UK. They had an amazing 1.90ct demantoid and a beautiful 2.21ct sphene that looked like a similar colour to my three - so I had a play putting it next to other colours. I think I''ve decided it looks best all on it''s own!
On the whole I was pretty disappointed with the general quality. The UK public are obviously not discriminating buyers!
I didn''t look at any diamonds - if I want to see them I go to New Bond Street.
Oh yes, every single place I went into they admired my very fine "emerald" - I was pretty concerned when the girl in Holt''s did, but at least the manager who came over knew exactly what it was.
Finally, they wanted $4k +VAT @17.5% for a 2.5mm curved platinum band with 24 channel-set 0.02ct melee. The melee alone were $1.2k for 0.48 tctw. Unbelievable!!! Oh, and only one of the vendors wanted to borrow my e-ring to fit the band to it. I was truly shocked!
That said, I tried on around 30 curved bands and they all fitted extremely well, so I''m going to see if they can use the CAD from my e-ring to make one in the US. At least I know what I''m getting in terms of melee - no-one bothered to ask what colour or clarity I had/wanted - to say nothing of much better customer service!
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