Pomelo
Brilliant_Rock
- Joined
- Oct 20, 2015
- Messages
- 544
PS, I’ve been wishing for a bit of sparkle on the wrist for some time now. The only two wrist-things in my current collection are both solid YG bangles (Cartier JUC and Hermes CDC) and whilst they’ve both served me well, I’ve been dreaming about dusting my wrist with some diamonds.
Inspired by @Tonks 's detailed post on Vivian, I wanted to document my (rather lengthy!) decision making process for this custom DBTY bracelet.
TLDR: after trying on a range of bangles and tennis bracelets (ranging from 3ctw to 30ctw+!), I realised that I value the design elements of negative space and asymmetry, and wanted a bracelet that worked hard for both day and night. The result is an 8-station “scattered” DBTY with a variety of diamond sizes in D-G colour and an asymmetric design. Scroll to the bottom for pics!
I also created some solitaire pieces: a pair of bezel-set studs and a floating bezel-set ring, these used L-M diamonds set in YG.
1. Initial research and finding out my taste
I initially thought I wanted a tennis bracelet that could work for both day and night, and stack with my bangles. I lapped up tennis bracelet SMTBs and took every opportunity to try them on in person.
Here is a compendium of what I tried on: tennis bracelets in traditional round diamonds ranging from 3ctw to 25ctw, mixed cut and step cut diamonds ranging from 7ct to 30ctw+, Georgian and Victorian bangles at 3.5ctw to 9-10ctw.
Trust me when I say that I’ve had fun trying them on, but truthfully none of them felt “right” on my wrist: it didn’t feel like me when the diamonds were all the same size, or when they were softly graduated. It didn’t feel like me when they were a continuous line around my wrist. And most of all, I found tennis bracelets to be quite heavy!
2. Moving away from a “tennis” design
It wasn’t until I saw @LLJsmom 's 6-motif pave VCA and I tried on a VCA 5-motif bracelet that I realised how much I valued the negative space between each station. Plus, the incredible quality of the VCA pave set against WG genuinely made me giddy with delight.
For me, the sections of unadorned chain provides visual interest and draws more attention to each station. Indeed, the WG pave onyx VCA bracelet was so beautiful that I actually brought it home with me - probably the first impulse buy I’ve had with fine jewellery!
However, after getting some great insights and advice from @diamondseeker2006 , @Tonks and @oldcutclubmember on how they wear their VCA, I realised the bracelet wouldn’t work for me.
For one, I am so lazy that I don’t remove my jewellery for sleep, shower or exercise (I call this my SSEx test, hah!). For another, I don’t own or wear enough WG.
So back to VCA it went (cry!) and I thought hard about what I wanted from my first ever diamond bracelet.
I also tried on the most substantial DBTY at Tiffany but found the diamonds (0.18ct each, 1.26ctw) to be too small for my liking.
3. The criteria
To be honest, I should’ve started with the criteria first. However, I think it took time for me to figure out what I wanted from a diamond bracelet.
4. The design
The easy decisions were:
In the end, I found that it was too hard to come up with an “ideal” design without certain parameters. So I decided to go diamond hunting first: a range of 0.2-0.5ct diamonds with faceting and angles close to super ideal (but my preference is biased towards fire - so you’ll see a few 35-36.5 degree crown angles). I am less concerned about clarity so as long as it’s eye clean, I’m happy.
You will notice that I bought more diamonds than I needed for the bracelet and some are yellower than others - I was curious about the difference between D and M coloured diamonds in real life, after they had been set; and so these were earmarked for other projects.
Inspired by a few PSers in my research, I decided:
Once I knew what sized diamonds would be where in the line-up, it came to matching the diamonds so those of a similar colour are next to each other (max 2 colour grades apart - I am not colour sensitive so figured this would be okay).
The diamonds themselves ended up being 0.19-0.42ct, D-G, VS1-SI2 on a 15.5cm bracelet length.
5. Concluding thoughts
Whilst I’m a huge fan of old cut stones and thought about sourcing old stones for the project, I feel that in smaller carat weights it’s hard to see the delicious chunky facets and it’s also hard to find a bunch of well-cut old cut stones, especially online and without seeing them in person. Hence why I focussed on MRBs here. I’m glad I did because the performance is fantastic!
I’ve lived with this bracelet for a couple of weeks now and there are pro’s and con’s that I’d like to share in case anyone else is thinking of doing a similar project.
Pro’s:
Most of all, I like that no one else has a DBTY design quite like this; it’s rather uniquely me.
Inspired by @Tonks 's detailed post on Vivian, I wanted to document my (rather lengthy!) decision making process for this custom DBTY bracelet.
TLDR: after trying on a range of bangles and tennis bracelets (ranging from 3ctw to 30ctw+!), I realised that I value the design elements of negative space and asymmetry, and wanted a bracelet that worked hard for both day and night. The result is an 8-station “scattered” DBTY with a variety of diamond sizes in D-G colour and an asymmetric design. Scroll to the bottom for pics!
I also created some solitaire pieces: a pair of bezel-set studs and a floating bezel-set ring, these used L-M diamonds set in YG.
1. Initial research and finding out my taste
I initially thought I wanted a tennis bracelet that could work for both day and night, and stack with my bangles. I lapped up tennis bracelet SMTBs and took every opportunity to try them on in person.
Here is a compendium of what I tried on: tennis bracelets in traditional round diamonds ranging from 3ctw to 25ctw, mixed cut and step cut diamonds ranging from 7ct to 30ctw+, Georgian and Victorian bangles at 3.5ctw to 9-10ctw.
Trust me when I say that I’ve had fun trying them on, but truthfully none of them felt “right” on my wrist: it didn’t feel like me when the diamonds were all the same size, or when they were softly graduated. It didn’t feel like me when they were a continuous line around my wrist. And most of all, I found tennis bracelets to be quite heavy!
2. Moving away from a “tennis” design
It wasn’t until I saw @LLJsmom 's 6-motif pave VCA and I tried on a VCA 5-motif bracelet that I realised how much I valued the negative space between each station. Plus, the incredible quality of the VCA pave set against WG genuinely made me giddy with delight.
For me, the sections of unadorned chain provides visual interest and draws more attention to each station. Indeed, the WG pave onyx VCA bracelet was so beautiful that I actually brought it home with me - probably the first impulse buy I’ve had with fine jewellery!
However, after getting some great insights and advice from @diamondseeker2006 , @Tonks and @oldcutclubmember on how they wear their VCA, I realised the bracelet wouldn’t work for me.
For one, I am so lazy that I don’t remove my jewellery for sleep, shower or exercise (I call this my SSEx test, hah!). For another, I don’t own or wear enough WG.
So back to VCA it went (cry!) and I thought hard about what I wanted from my first ever diamond bracelet.
I also tried on the most substantial DBTY at Tiffany but found the diamonds (0.18ct each, 1.26ctw) to be too small for my liking.
3. The criteria
To be honest, I should’ve started with the criteria first. However, I think it took time for me to figure out what I wanted from a diamond bracelet.
- Laziness: passes my test for sleep, shower and exercise. This means that it must be comfortable but also substantial enough to transition from day to night
- Negative space: chain between each motif or station of the bracelet
- Visual interest / asymmetry: a mix of sizes or shapes
4. The design
The easy decisions were:
- 18k YG - I wear a lot of YG
- Bezel setting - love the clean, minimalist look of a bezel and that it’s great for klutzy people like me
- Chain thickness to be 1.2-1.4mm. Didn’t want to go thinner than this (because I’ve had a Louis Vuitton fine bracelet snap off before and disappear whilst running errands)
- How many diamond stations?
- How big should each diamond be? What colour should they be?
- What spacing between each station?
In the end, I found that it was too hard to come up with an “ideal” design without certain parameters. So I decided to go diamond hunting first: a range of 0.2-0.5ct diamonds with faceting and angles close to super ideal (but my preference is biased towards fire - so you’ll see a few 35-36.5 degree crown angles). I am less concerned about clarity so as long as it’s eye clean, I’m happy.
You will notice that I bought more diamonds than I needed for the bracelet and some are yellower than others - I was curious about the difference between D and M coloured diamonds in real life, after they had been set; and so these were earmarked for other projects.
Inspired by a few PSers in my research, I decided:
- I like the look of big and little diamonds juxtaposed, rather than graduated - like @icy_jade 's diamond ‘bubble’ bracelet
- Uneven spacing between each station provided even more visual interest e.g. Boodles raindance design
- The practicality of a culet poking into skin is not fun, and so I wanted to place the fewest number of diamonds and the smallest diamonds on the underside of the wrist (closest to the clasp) - thank you @RunningwithScissors for mentioning this on your WF DBTY. I also decided to set the largest diamonds (0.4ct) in a deeper setting so that the culet does not touch my skin; all the other stones have a Tiffany DBTY design where the exposed culet does touch my skin
- To mitigate the inevitable spinning, sizing the bracelet to fit relatively snug
- D-G colour diamonds - wanted to see brighter, whiter diamonds pop against the YG bezel
Once I knew what sized diamonds would be where in the line-up, it came to matching the diamonds so those of a similar colour are next to each other (max 2 colour grades apart - I am not colour sensitive so figured this would be okay).
The diamonds themselves ended up being 0.19-0.42ct, D-G, VS1-SI2 on a 15.5cm bracelet length.
5. Concluding thoughts
Whilst I’m a huge fan of old cut stones and thought about sourcing old stones for the project, I feel that in smaller carat weights it’s hard to see the delicious chunky facets and it’s also hard to find a bunch of well-cut old cut stones, especially online and without seeing them in person. Hence why I focussed on MRBs here. I’m glad I did because the performance is fantastic!
I’ve lived with this bracelet for a couple of weeks now and there are pro’s and con’s that I’d like to share in case anyone else is thinking of doing a similar project.
Pro’s:
- Easy to wear
- Lightweight yet substantial - because each stone is 0.2-0.4ct
- Each diamond sparkles a lot but the overall look is not overwhelming, great for day-to-night
- The biggest downside is that the culets poke into my skin - it’s fine in aircon, but when my wrist swells outside in the summer heat, it can get uncomfortable. Am debating whether to increase the depth of the setting, but then it looks less ‘floaty’ - compare the clunkier look of the 0.4ct vs 0.2ct stones (you can see the culet dents in my skin)
- Flipping: this was inevitable. It doesn’t flip much but I do find myself adjusting it several times a day
- Stacking: I originally wanted to stack it with my JUC but because the bangle crosses over the bracelet throughout the day, it doesn’t look neat and also presses the exposed culets into my skin
Most of all, I like that no one else has a DBTY design quite like this; it’s rather uniquely me.
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