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Dumb question about princess tables...

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Ideal_Rock
Joined
Mar 15, 2004
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OK- this might be a dumb question experts ...but is this correct:

It''s not necessarily the smaller table (say, in the ideal range to 68) that makes a princess have more fire or brillinace (which ever lol) but it is the relation of the table to the depth, together with the crown and pavillion angles that makes the stone perform?

....so...all else equal....will a 70 depth 67 princess, perform just as well as a 73 detph, 70 table? Or do you really kind of want the smaller tables (say, up to 68, 69)?

Was just wondering about this b/c I happened to see a stone that looked (online) possibly nice....2.21 carat...72.1 depth and 70 table... 7.08 X 7.05....the spread seemed to make me think that it could still possibly have good crown height...I hadn''t been looking at tables that large...hmmm. interesting....for me at least!
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That's what I was told too! That if the depth is deeper, than it has to have a matching table. That the RATIO between the two is the sacred part, and that the angles of the crown and pav have to be magical, just like some people like the 34, 41 angles on a round stone I am told...

is this true, because i too am having doubts about stones needing to be under 70% depth and table to look good.

I am told however, that when they are OVEr the 72-72 marks, that just means they are adding extra carat weight, and you are not getting an efficient stone, but it can still look good, I suppose?
 
well, I think that most diamonds with "decent" numbers can be beautiful...And you are right, a stone need not have a 68 or less table to be beautiful...

I'm just wondering if ALL else is equal (which I know would never happen...this is more just a learning question)...will one actually perform slightly better than the other or is the difference insignificant?

One thing that I have learned for sure with princess stones is that they must be seen...I've seen stones that perform great but are not visually pleasing to me...

Holly- did you settle on a stone yet? Seriously, I understand wanting more bang for the buck...but there is also a lot to be said for a super performing stone!!! Even though it might be a bit smaller. Quality is always apparent I think.
 
follow up- regarding your efficiency point...that might be depth you're talking about (over 72, not efficient)...because that's when the stones carry more weight underneath...the larger table actually makes the stone look bigger!
 
I am NOT an expert on the cutting of princess cut diamonds, although I shall probably learn to be as soon as AGS publishes their standards sometime within the next year, especially since Paul Slegers will be cutting princess cut diamonds to the AGS triple zero cutting standards. (I wonder what he will call them, something both symbolic and romantic no doubt.)

All of that having been said. I DO NOT LIKE BIG TABLES ON PRINCESS CUT STONES!

I don't much care what the experts say, I just don't like them. Yes I have seen stones with 80% tables that looked nice, they just did not look great. I confess, I am just not a numbers guy, the stone has to look great.

One of the "biggest" mistakes I ever made at the buying table in Antwerp was to buy an incredible looking stone that weighed 1.07cts. I judged the stone with only a loupe and an H color master stone to be a G-SI1, it came back from GIA graded to be an F-SI1. It was offered to me as a true "metzia" (bargain) at more than 50% back of the price sheet for a G. Why was it a mistake you ask?

Because the stone had a 98% depth. It is still one of the most incredible princess cut stones I have ever seen, but when I got back to the states and properly measured the stone I realize it was so cheap because it looked so small. It had the spread of and the appearance of an incredible .75ct stone.

It took me three years to sell it because I always made a point out of telling people of its "defect". I finally sold it to a young man, a family friend, who was looking for a 3/4 princess because he did not want to spend the money on a carat. He is now ecstatic and so is she with her incredible 1.07ct stone and both appreciate its uniqueness. When I finally showed the stone to someone who wanted beauty rather than paper, it found a happy home. By the way, I bought it so well that I sold it for a Metzia price for a three-quarter carater, let alone the full carater that it was. It is still the most beautiful princess that I have ever seen, cutting "defect" and all.

So what is the proper table and depth ratio you ask me? I do not honestly know or care. (blasphemer!) What I care about is how does the stone look!?
 
DARN YOU WINK!!!! LOL....BUT....let me re-phrase and maybe I can weasel an answer out of you yet.....if everything else is equal, will the 70 67 outperform the 73 70? Or is this not possible to answer b/c "everything else" is never equal!!!!???
 
Then why is it that round stones are poured over and analyzed to death, and all people tell me about princess stones are..just see them? Frankyl, I am curious to know if ANYONE studies square stones to exacting standards?

These triple cut princess stones, are they currently available? What are the price points/ Who sells them around the Florida/Atlanta area?
 
oh wait...you did answer my question...LOL, you blasphemer!!!
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Thanks Wink!!!
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So I guess the answer is........it will cost me $180 bucks shipping to find out the answer! LOL...
 
Holly- I thought you wanted big for the buck?
 
Damn AGS for not coming out with their Princess cutting standards earlier!
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eh- screw em! LOL....It's so true...I keep wanting "answers" but none exist...you just gotta see the little buggers to know!
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Well, my Si1 is SO going back...awaiting word from Jonathan....!!!!
 
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On 6/7/2004 10:57:53 AM HollyGo-Lightly wrote:

Then why is it that round stones are poured over and analyzed to death, and all people tell me about princess stones are..just see them? Frankyl, I am curious to know if ANYONE studies square stones to exacting standards?

These triple cut princess stones, are they currently available? What are the price points/ Who sells them around the Florida/Atlanta area?----------------
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They are not available yet since AGS has not announced what the standards will be yet. Dave Atlas has some good standards that he has developed, but if his are different than what GIA or AGS publishes, when they do, then he will be trumped with their more recognized name.

The reason that we say to see them, is that some look incredible, and some reek. The numbers are not yet well enough defined to say which is going to be which and some stones with VERY similar numbers look absolutely different with one being incredible and another being horrible. I would NEVER have bought the stone I talked about above if I had been looking at numbers, yet it was a glorious stone that I bought instantly on being offered it, after my budget had already been spent because it was so beautiful.

As far as studying to death the round stones, you are correct. We are a bit too anal there at times, you must still look at the stones. I have seen fairly lifeless H&A cut stones that should be incredible by the numbers, and I just sold a 1.87ct stone with a 62% table that the lady chose over a H&A stone that to my eyes was a much better stone. Why? because at 1.87cts it was noticeably larger than the 1.58ct Venus by Infinity stone. Her fiance and I were both surprized, we agreed that the 1.58 was more beautiful, but it was not even a hard decision for her. Put the stones on the table and that was the one she wanted, end of necessity for discussion.

Wink
 
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On 6/7/2004 11:06:10 AM moremoremore wrote:

eh- screw em! LOL....It's so true...I keep wanting 'answers' but none exist...you just gotta see the little buggers to know!
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Well, my Si1 is SO going back...awaiting word from Jonathan....!!!!----------------
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Jonathan,

It is not my fault! I had nothing to do with this decision! LOL!

Wink
 
LOL...NO, it's not you Wink! I LOVE my princess to death (had it for a few days)....UUUUHHHH, except for that big black carbon dot visible face up from about 8 inches away. There was no way I (or Jonathan) could have seen it in the store...I find that stones tend to look darker in teh stores...I took one look at home and the black dot started tormenting and mocking me!
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I've emailed Jonathan about it and need to see some more. The 70 table one looked interesting...I'm not really sure I'll be going the Si1 route again. Too much of a gamble when paying for shipping fees!
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oh, and it would have helped if rocket scientist over here asked to see the cert of the stone under the microscope in the store. Duh.
 
I really think you're all on the right track in terms of focusing on the depth % vs. table % rather than just finding a stone with an ideal table and an ideal depth. My stone, although rather deep, has a table that coincides nicely with it and, as such, meets the desired crown and pavilion angles (which are discussed at http://www.princess-diamonds.com/).

Also, if you read all the info on diamonds in general, you will see that the table size and pavilion depth impact the brilliance of the stone, while the crown angles and table size impact the fire of the stone. When a small table is paired with steep crown angles, the stone tends to have more fire but less brilliance; when a slightly larger table is paired with a stone that is not too deep or too shallow, the stone will be more brilliant.

As such, I honestly think that people will have differing opinions on princess cuts depending on whether they prefer brilliance or fire, or a combination of both. Also, there are people like the wonderful moremoremore who prefer stones that have more dispersed scintilation rather than risk the chance of the stone having darker areas that detract from the absolute whiteness of the stone.

I guess where I'm going with all of this is that, because princess stones can be cut to retain more weight than rounds, there can be more variation in terms of the proper depth or table. For instance, pretend that rounds can only be cut to have a depth that differs by a couple %. It becomes MUCH easier to determine the other angles and %'s when one of the major factors is pretty stable (just as with equations, the fewer "unknowns", the easier it is to solve). With princess stones, there is a much larger range of depth percentages that can be cut and still considered "ideal". Accordingly, it is much harder to determine the other angles and %'s. It is for this reason that I believe that it's much harder to determine whether a princess is "ideal", and why you really need to see the stone in person.

Am I making any sense? I hope so! Although I'm not an expert on diamonds, I was crazy in my search for a diamond and viewed several (and by several I literally mean hundreds) of princess cut stones to try and see the difference between stones with different depths, crown heights, tables, etc. What I discovered is I prefer stones with tables less than (or at most equal to) the depth (with both numbers in the high 60's to low/mid 70's), and stones with crown heights of at least 10%. Interestingly, the lower the depth, the lower it seemed the crown height could go (although I would never go for a crown lower than 8%). This may, in part, be why Blue Nile signature princess cuts or other signature cuts will include stones with crown heights lower than what most would consider ideal--the depths may just be lower, but the angles may be appropriate.

Anyway, these are just the trends I've noticed. They may or may not be accurate, but they helped me to choose an amazing stone!
 
At last Moremoremore, someone with a reasonable answer to your question. Now get out there and LOOK at some more stones... LOL!

Wink
 
I was waiting for her Wink!!!
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Yes, I'm going to look. Jonathan will surely curse the day he ever met me...I feel bad b/c this was an internet stone...so how does that work...poor J has to get a refund from the seller....how ever long that takes? Ugh. Oh well, I guess I need to make myself happy first...There are three more I am looking at if they are available...have to wait for J to get back from his trip to see if he can (or even wants to lol) get them in for me.

Wink- I do love the jubilees...that will be my next purchase...unless of course, there is a 1.95 G si1 hanging around somewhere!
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moremoremore,
You should NOT feel bad about returning the stone!!! You need to be happy with your purchase, and although the other stone was a beauty, it didn't suit you. Period. I'm sure Jonathan will not have a problem reselling that stone! It really is lovely, and if someone is not sensitive to inclusions (or is not given the loupe--LOL) he/she will be very glad that you passed it up :-)

So you've found three stones to consider? That's great! How do the numbers look? You can feel free to PM me if you're having trouble deciding--you know I love to see stone specs because I'm weird like that!
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And Wink, thanks for the compliments but my take on things is purely speculation at this point. But, as someone who works off of theories, what I stated previously is the only thing I could come up with that seemed to encompass the various viewpoints of the experts. Let's see if it holds up, or if one of the experts will shoot me down!
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Nice thing about the experts around here is that they may dissagree with you from time to time, but rarely will they shoot anyone down in flames who has not been REALLY asking for it!

I would think that you are pretty safe from that aspect, so lets see if they agree or not...

I admit to not having studies princess cuts enough to venture whether or not you are correct. I sell a few of them, but prefer the rounds and Jubilees to most princess cuts that I have seen. Man, that is one nice square, the new Jubilee!

Wink
 
I LOVE the jubilee! Can't wait until I can afford one in the 3 ct range!

And as for the experts, you're right about them being pretty tactful with their responses, disagreeing rather than cutting people down. I've only had one response on this forum that I thought was rather rude, and it was by someone who knew what she wanted and wasn't really up for hearing alternative perspectives. Other than that, everyone has been really great! I was actually just kinda joking around when I said we would just have to wait to see if one of the experts shoots me down--it just seems that, whenever I seem to have a real handle on princess cuts, someone throws in a new perspective or additional information that kills my previous theory. It's frustrating, but extremely interesting at the same time! I've learned TONS on this forum in a very short period of time, and for that I am extremely grateful
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BTW, is it true that you are selling the jubilee as well?
 
Yes, but I do not advertise them on the net, Jonathon has tied that up, a great move on his part! I will sell them to my local clientele and to my existing cl;ients, they are a beautiful stone!

Wink
 
Good to know! Lucky you to have them in your hands! I can't wait to see one in person!!!
 
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