Diamond District in NYC

[Jenga019]

I have been asking around as to the best place to buy an engagement ring. I am from maryland and a few people have told me how great the diamond district in NYC is. Do you think it''s worth me going up there and checking out? What has been everyone else''s experiences???

 

[sparkler29]

I agree with Alexah - my fiance did end up finding my stone with a vendor who has a booth in the diamond district, but he put a lot of time (and many visits) into it. He happens to work from home and has a flexible schedule, so this allowed him more time to do this. Even though I LOVE my stone, and overall it was a good experience, the vendor was at times pushy or would "yes" my fiance in order to get him to purchase a stone. An example of one conversation I recently learned about:

Vendor: Now THIS is a beautiful stone. She will love it.
Fiance (looking at stone through loupe): What about this large black inclusion on the table?
Vendor: Yes, you're right, it's not the stone for you...it's a terrible stone.

It takes a very patient person who has done extensive research and knows what to look out for to be able to deal with some of the vendors in the diamond district. Once my fiance decided to go with this particular vendor, he went back to the booth about 8 times to look at various stones. If you stick with the PS vendors I think you'll do well. Another one is engagementringsdirect.com - I believe Reena purchased her stone through them in person. The diamond dist. is good for browsing and getting ideas for what you'd like - but proceed with caution. Do lots of research prior to going. There are certainly good stones to be found, but you need to be careful.

 

[Jennifer5973]

----------------
On 9/27/2004 2:11:03 PM sparkler29 wrote:
It takes a very patient person who has done extensive research and knows what to look out for to be able to deal with some of the vendors in the diamond district. ... The diamond dist. is good for browsing and getting ideas for what you'd like - but proceed with caution. Do lots of research prior to going. There are certainly good stones to be found, but you need to be careful.----------------

Excellent summary and what I have found to be true.

 

[hoorray]

I agree also.

I had always heard that the NY Diamond Distrist was THE place to buy. We looked there since we were staying nearby once, at the beginning of our search. Thank goodness my DH's impulse type-A personality didn't buy at the time. We went home, educated ourselves about what to look for and the market prices, and realized that we would have been buying "B' quality material. "Close to" ideal stones instead of "super ideal" at a higher price.

But...it was a great starting place, and if you know what you are doing (which we didn't at the time), I hear you can find beautiful things. Just be smart......

 

[roadpupp]

I work close to 47th.




I spent 6 lunch hours browsing. This was my experience.




Exchange vendors. These are giant halls with many small booths. I am sure there are good deals to be had and good vendors there. However, the atmosphere just turned me right off. I was looking for a Verragio setting and already had some prices. The few vendors I found didn't have much in stock and I was trying to decide which Verragio I wanted. This didn't help as they would have to order what I wanted to see. The price the very nice woman quoted me was much higher than the Brick and Mortor shop down the street. I am sure she would have moved on the price, but I didn't want to have to wait for her to get the setting in. Again the loud, bright atmosphere was NOT what I wanted and after spending 20 minutes of browsing other booths, I left.




I also went to a few smallish single storefront stores. There they tried to sell me non GIA or mis represented stones. These guys felt unctious and I didn't trust them at all. Others wanted to do custom settings of everything and said they would knock off whatever photos I brought in.




I did go to Michael C Fina. They were very nice and had a nice selection of settings, but alas, not the ones I wanted. The offered to order them for me but also stated that I had to make an appointment to see diamonds. This was too high end for me I guess as I just wanted to get a sense of what the settings were and a ballpark on the stone specs I had in mind.




Finally I went back to Shenoa and Co on 47th. Medium sized single storefront and met with Kerry. He is their production manager but I had met him in the store the first time. Before he was helping me I had some lower tier guy who was screwing things up, he kept putting the settings away and we would have to hunt for them. I also didn't like the way he was asking me what I thought the setting should cost.




Kerry walked in, saw I was frustrated and made it all better! They had lots of settings in stock and a good stock of stones in my range. I got the specs on a few diamonds (they had Sarins on all the stones I was interested in, I think they have a Sarin machine of thier own) and then came here to do my research.




When I made up my mind, we bargiained a little and I paid a few hundred more than the Online prices for the stone and much lower (from what I could see) for the setting.




One thing, they didn't seem to know the difference between the really cherry AGS 000's and the ones with numbers that barely passed. This is a good thing! I was able to get a stone that hit 0.7 on the Pricescope cut calculator instead of a similar stone that was 2.3. He didn't care which I bought as they both said OOO on the AGS. They also shipped my ring FEDEX to my mom's house (out of state) to save me the $500 in tax.




Sorry for the long winded post. I had a good experience with Shenoa and CO even though they seem to have some questionable Ebay auctions with un certed diamonds.




The reason I went this route was that I wanted a B and M store to be able to go back to if my girlfriend wants a different setting or stone. She was not a part of picking it out. I am confident I got a good deal and I KNOW I got a good stone, thanks to the people here and the education I got on this site.




Good luck.

 

[LuvthatSparkle]

Ah!!! 47th. street. How many hours have I spent drooling in the windows. However, my habitual visitation of this street has led me to one conclusion. REFERRAL!!!! they are pushy! they are rude! they want to make a sale, they want your money! You can't go in there uneducated it's not in your best interest. However there are vendors who are very pleasant to work with so in all of 47th street I have two referrals:




David G. Diamonds, 56 West 47th. Street.


I have been working with David for 4 years. He's a sweetheart! He's patient and honest and has lots of happy customers. Dave doesn't have alot of inventory, he's great if you know what you want, call him ahead of time and he can have merchandise available for you to view. My cousin wanted this engagement ring she saw in a Mall and I begged her not to buy it (astronomical prices), so she took the same idea to Dave, she's getting larger stones for less money! She owes me dinner!




Signed Pieces, 15 West 47th, 212-382-1374


These guys are new on my list cause I've been loyal to Dave. I visited them a few times to look at merchandise and I'm waiting to see a new design they're working on. They have more inventory and more pretty baubles to play with. Also they have quality standards on the diamonds they sell, I can appreciate that.

 

[brockc]

I''ve been looking at Shenoa through Ebay. Any thoughts as a lot of the comments at EBay suggest Shenoa way over inflates the quality of the rings they are selling. Also, unlike their website, the only certification they offer is from NGL which doesn''t come up on any google searches.

Any help would be appreciated as the girlfriend is getting anxious!

thx

Date: 9/28/2004 8:38

8 AM
Author: roadpupp


I work close to 47th.




I spent 6 lunch hours browsing. This was my experience.




Exchange vendors. These are giant halls with many small booths. I am sure there are good deals to be had and good vendors there. However, the atmosphere just turned me right off. I was looking for a Verragio setting and already had some prices. The few vendors I found didn''t have much in stock and I was trying to decide which Verragio I wanted. This didn''t help as they would have to order what I wanted to see. The price the very nice woman quoted me was much higher than the Brick and Mortor shop down the street. I am sure she would have moved on the price, but I didn''t want to have to wait for her to get the setting in. Again the loud, bright atmosphere was NOT what I wanted and after spending 20 minutes of browsing other booths, I left.




I also went to a few smallish single storefront stores. There they tried to sell me non GIA or mis represented stones. These guys felt unctious and I didn''t trust them at all. Others wanted to do custom settings of everything and said they would knock off whatever photos I brought in.




I did go to Michael C Fina. They were very nice and had a nice selection of settings, but alas, not the ones I wanted. The offered to order them for me but also stated that I had to make an appointment to see diamonds. This was too high end for me I guess as I just wanted to get a sense of what the settings were and a ballpark on the stone specs I had in mind.




Finally I went back to Shenoa and Co on 47th. Medium sized single storefront and met with Kerry. He is their production manager but I had met him in the store the first time. Before he was helping me I had some lower tier guy who was screwing things up, he kept putting the settings away and we would have to hunt for them. I also didn''t like the way he was asking me what I thought the setting should cost.




Kerry walked in, saw I was frustrated and made it all better! They had lots of settings in stock and a good stock of stones in my range. I got the specs on a few diamonds (they had Sarins on all the stones I was interested in, I think they have a Sarin machine of thier own) and then came here to do my research.




When I made up my mind, we bargiained a little and I paid a few hundred more than the Online prices for the stone and much lower (from what I could see) for the setting.




One thing, they didn''t seem to know the difference between the really cherry AGS 000''s and the ones with numbers that barely passed. This is a good thing! I was able to get a stone that hit 0.7 on the Pricescope cut calculator instead of a similar stone that was 2.3. He didn''t care which I bought as they both said OOO on the AGS. They also shipped my ring FEDEX to my mom''s house (out of state) to save me the $500 in tax.




Sorry for the long winded post. I had a good experience with Shenoa and CO even though they seem to have some questionable Ebay auctions with un certed diamonds.




The reason I went this route was that I wanted a B and M store to be able to go back to if my girlfriend wants a different setting or stone. She was not a part of picking it out. I am confident I got a good deal and I KNOW I got a good stone, thanks to the people here and the education I got on this site.




Good luck.

 

[reena]

have you done a search for "shenoa" on this site? i would do that before deciding whether to buy there. good luck!

 

[blueroses]

BF and I window shopped in the diamond district and I think this experience sums up the place:

We''re looking in a window, talking, checking some stuff out, and in our peripheral vision something''s going on all of a sudden.....the guy inside is placing this hand-held "SALE" sign right in front of us--inches from our faces behind the window--w/ this smirky-grin...I mean, it was funny and all, but that seems to encapsulate the whole hustle-feel.

 

[windowshopper]

you are nuts if you go to the diamond district (any pricescope vendor will just kill the D. Dostrict) Dirt cheap Diamonds is in Maryland and they have awesome prices and selection....................i belive they are in frederick or potomac..........cant remember. the diamond district is a scam in so far as an "bargains" go.......................

 

[Narcosis]

Go speak with Isaac @ Signed Pieces, 15 West 47th, 212-382-1374. I didn`t buy a ring from them but after spending some time in there with him I could tell he`s a stand-up no BS guy.