CHOICE of STONES

[chowchow99]

I am thinking of buying my wife a loose stone and then having it set.
Dollar for dollar am I better off getting a round brilliant or an emerald cut? Which stone has more fire and brilliance to it? Of course I''m comparing like quality stones.
The size would be 2.5 to 3.0 carats. D or E color and at least VS1 ideal cut (symmetry and polish) I feel pretty confident that my wife would be happy with either cut.
What would the best measurements be for such a stone? ie... table,depth,girdle and any other measurements would help.
I have been getting very conflicting stories about 60/60 and 53.9 for the table and all sorts of different stories.
Please help!!!!
Thanks

 

[Mara]

Well I'm not too sure about round vs Emerald...best thing is to price out a few options for each and see which gives you the more bang for your buck.




In terms of well-cut for round brilliants, check out the Pricescope tutorial. I personally am not a fan of 60/60 but some people are. If I was looking for a RB well cut stone, I would do something like the following:




Table: 54-57


Depth: 60-61.9


Crown Angle: 34.5-34.8


Pav Angle: 40.5-40.8 (or maybe 40.9)




But you can also have great looking stones with shallower crown angles and higher pav angles for compensation (e.g. 33.9 crown angle and 40.9 pav angle). So it's hard to really say what you should stick within for 'well-cut'. I would get an IdealScope image to see light return and that will help you out.




A few things to note is that smaller tables (e.g. 54%) will give you slightly more fire in the stone, depending on the depth. A larger table (e.g. 57 or 58%) will most likely give more white brilliance to that stone. So if you feel strongly for one either way, you can manipulate the ranges I gave above (or even slightly out of that) to your tastes (e.g. want a slightly more fiery stone, go for 54% table and 60% depth with a slightly steeper crown angle of maybe 35 and a pav angle of 40.6 and you should have a stunner--0.7 EX EX EX EX on the HCA!).




But hanging around here a bit, reading up on some posts, and the tutorial will do you wonders! Good luck

 

[Hest88]

Well, an EC would be cheaper, but a RB would be a lot more brilliant. There are also a ton of other factors. It would be easier to find a great RB on numbers alone; you'd need the guidance of a good jeweler to get a great EC.

 

[Hodne]

Check out these beauties!

http://www.goodoldgold.com/2_63ct_d_vvs2_h%26a.htm

http://www.goodoldgold.com/2_73ct_e_vvs1_h%26a.htm

Drool!!!

 

[Mara]

Man those are some expensive stones!!

Since I'm not a VVS fan...here are some other options if you don't want to spend $50k.

http://www.goodoldgold.com/2_18ct_g_vs2_h%26a.htm




http://www.goodoldgold.com/3_06ct_g_vs1__h%26a.htm




http://www.goodoldgold.com/2_24ct_e_si2__h%26a.htm




This last one intrigues me the most because of the price, the color being so great and the fact that it looks like it's almost eye-clean...and probably will be eye-clean to 99 out of 100 people who see the stone....the 1 out of 100 is the person who owns it and knows where the inclusion is...see the notes on the page.

Great deal.




You noted D or E color, but I have a G stone and it is absolutely WHITE with no hint of color--we compared it LOOSE against an E and saw no difference...so depending on your budget, you may want to add in a little flexibility with the color option.




GOG is just one vendor out there....there are alot of others, use the Pricescope cut quality search engine: http://www.pricescope.com/sift.asp to help you search out some well cut stones. Good luck!

 

[phoenixgirl]

Here are some more.

2.54 D IF (gasp) for $69K

3.01 D VS1 for $65K

Abazias.com has some in this range with AGS certs, which provide the crown and pavilion angles that will indicate how the diamond will perform.

If this isn't the kind of budget you are operating with, we can come up with other suggestions.

 

[fire&ice]

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On 1/18/2004 10:10:49 PM Hest88 wrote:

Well, an EC would be cheaper, but a RB would be a lot more brilliant. There are also a ton of other factors. It would be easier to find a great RB on numbers alone; you'd need the guidance of a good jeweler to get a great EC.

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Ditto w/ what Hest88 says & to add - if you are going the EC route color & clarity need to be more in the range you are thinking. An RB masks far more color & clarity. Also, the RB is going to look much larger for the carat weight. Her hand shape & size needs to be examined.