going fancy

[ganort]

Hi, and first off let me send my appreciation for all of the awesome knowledge I have gained from you all in the past few days. Take a bow

Any who, I’m looking to make a 3 princess stone E-ring, and for the special ''one of a kind touch'' I''ve been searching for a 3/4 to 1ct fancy blue center stone. Its been such a hassle to find a quantity of fancy coloured diamonds anywhere, but I finally found a local jewelry that has a supply and have shipped a couple to the store for me to view. Outstanding.. blue diamonds = the win imho.

Well now comes to the decision making process. From the first 2 I viewed they were both .71ct both very similar colour [*], but the cut of the first one was horrible... symmetry was awful, looked rectangular and even through the blue I could easily spot some spots. The second one looked much better... but spec''s as follows...

.71ct
5.32 x 5.24 x 3.33
crown H 8.4%
crown total depth 63.6%
pav depth 53.7%
pav table size 79%
thin girdle
SI
colour
2,800$

It truly is a marvelous stone, except that it is super shallow with only 63.6% depth and has huge table angle and size. But the dimensions likewise are huge...

I guess the question I pose myself is: I can afford a larger stone BUT since even the IDEAL dimensions of a .90 are just about the same as this one, and at about twice the price, why should I?

Also finding such a clean and well cut blue fancy is another journey in itself, partially to the fact that typically lesser quality diamonds are generally the candidates to go through the colour treatment process as the colour helps cover up their ''naughty bits''

All of your wonderfully insightful opinions are welcome

[/b]

 

[icelady]

Hi ganort,

I certainly have to give you a lot of credit for all the hard work you have put in on this project of yours!

Fancy cut stones are difficult at best to find the one that jumps out at you, since there are not a lot of standards and guidelines as with the RB.

One question I have for you is; does your gf like blue diamonds? Is it something you know for certain she will really like?

Just asking?

 

[ganort]

Hmmm... well I certainly hope she does. I think they look spectacular. I understand your perspective though, and I have given thought to perhaps setting blue's for the two sidestones .33-50c and going with a nock out colourless centerstone. I have seen one set like that online and i must say it did look awesome. Then the difficulty with finding a good blue fancy for the center stone would be alot easier giong with a f-h. Would just be a bit harder trying to find 2 real close shades of blue's for the sidestones...

What do you all think would be best
two blue sidestones and a colourless center stone
or
two colourless sidestones and a blue center stone?

-g-

 

[hoorray]

I like the look of the colored center with white sides, generally speaking. I haven't seen a blue and white combo other than with sapphires, so don't know specifically, but I would still lean that way.

I agree with icelady....you should probably get some feelers out there to make sure SHE likes this look. Shes the one who will wear it forever...

 

[ganort]

Ha, aye its so hard to get some feedback from her without giving too much away... Since everyone loves pictures here is a blue fancy diamond center.. The idea is to upping the carats to .33-50c side stones and .71-1c center stones; all princess cuts

But perhaps I should look into getting the side stones to be blue and surround a nice colourless diamond in the center... it would look more traditional especially it would help commoners from confusing the center stone as a sapphire.

comments from you professionals?

-g-

 

[diamondsbylauren]

Hi ganort
One thing that we have not mentioned here is that natural blue diamonds are generally in the $50,000+ per carat range.

SO we must assume the diamonds we are talking about here are are irradiated blue diamonds.

This might be a bother to some, but you are the determining factor here.
If you love them, and you're sure your intended will too, then by all means pick the one which has the visual characteristics you prefer.

 

[ganort]

Oh goodness gracious yes! Indeed I am talking about irradiated lol! Natural blue diamonds are super rare and super expensive! although 50k per carat sounds pretty nice and a good investment if you could buy the hope diamond on that scale!

All in all I have herd some people thinking the irradiation process as cheating or marring the diamond. I don’t agree with them as each diamond send through the process has a chance of turning any of many colours from orange to brown to purple. So all in all I would consider certain "more desirable" hues as more rarer than some colourless diamonds

Just my opinion

 

[hoorray]

I'm not the person who will receive the ring, but I would not want a treated stone for my e-ring. I'm a purest, especially for something like this, and really would not feel good about that. That said, others may love it. So again, I think it is important to figure out what she wants for her e-ring. Maybe friends or family know or can help you snoop it out. (People love to be involved in this sort of thing, and some friend or sister may already know what she really likes/or wants. )

 

[ganort]

Hmmm.. the more and more I think about it, and the more perspectives I receive; the more it looks like I should go for option 2 with the fancies on the side and a knock out F-H center stone...
Something similar to this only with blue fancies in place of the sapphires

the colour of blue irradiated vs. sapphires can be similar... but sapph's just don’t have that diamond fire and sparkle!

 

[valeria101]

I like that allot! Quite refreshing to see a simple, nicely made bezel setting every now and then

I wouldn't think irradiated diamonds are any worse - just let them be clean, well cut and sport a nice shade... Besides, not only it would be very costly to find a natural blue with matching specs, it may well be impossible. Those just do not come in such stryking aqua blue even with "vivid" on the cert. So if you want something blue and super sparkly, there might not be a natural choice after all, at any price. Even worse if you wanted them green instead of blue

However, I woudl think a set a blue sapphires with decent cutting will do the trick nicely. Sapphire is plenty sparkly by material properties alone, only stones are rarely cut at their brightest. You would need a pair with lighter tone (and most lower-quality stones are overly dark not overly light) and great cuting (same story as diamonds, relaly).

You might find THIS THREAD the respective sapphires interesting. Otherwise, why not get the zapped blues

 

[ganort]

Wow, thanks for the link valeria, Josh's re-cut sapph's came out outstanding, the before and after pictures were breath taking. Only thing is I think I'm going to go for the zapped blue diamonds to hug a center stone instead of sapph's after all. Besides, by the time I find a great matching pair of blues I'll have a good amount of cash to up the center stone. Now I just have to check out settings. The jeweler who had gotten me the original blue fancy had told me how pressure settings were bad as the diamonds could be easily 'banged' out.
I personally love the look of them because so much more of the stone(s) are more visible. Is there any merit to what I was told. (I would think that the girdle would play a good role into a pressure setting... not sure)

-g-

 

[valeria101]

I would thing tension setting are pretty safe. However, they are nor easily made by non-specialists (the metal needs special treatment to become springhy and most jewelers would not do that... for example). The jeweler would have to get the setting from someone else, he probably cannot make a tension setting.

Besides, a 3-stone tension? Those are not very usual at all. DO you mean something like THIS ?


I see your pics come from HERE and there seems to be plenty of stone slisted by this seller (no princess cuts and no tension rings though)... no luck? Another shop that occasionally deals with better quality irradiated diamonds is Tradeshop. Such stones were listed by them on occasion and some of the many custom projects listed contain some. I don't think they would make tension settings (but then, there are specialized sources for these) ... but, worth taking a look when you find time for all those dozens and dozens of custom projects