New to gemstones - sapphire help!

[Erinleigh]

Hi All,
FI and I are looking to purchase a sapphire ring for me (I'm a lucky girl ), and while I know a lot about diamonds, sapphires are a whole new ballgame! I'm looking for either an emerald cut or cushion cut sapphire, and am looking to spend about $1000 with it set in the ring.

Can anyone recommend pieces/stones/places to look/information/ anything else to help us begin this search? I'm not even sure if that budget will get us a non lab-created sapphire (which I'd like to avoid).

TIA!

 

[pregcurious]

There are several recent threads on buying sapphires that you can search for, and a recent one that you may want to read is:
[URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/help-me-make-find-the-perfect-sapphire-e-ring.163860/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/help-me-make-find-the-perfect-sapphire-e-ring.163860/[/URL]

 

[Justin_Cutter]

You should be able to get a natural sapphire for that budget as long as you keep your size expectations in check. I doubt you will be able to fine one that is unheated tho for that budget. If the setting isn't to expensive then it may be possible.

What is your goal in regards to the size of the stone? Remember that sapphires are more dense than diamonds so a 1ct sapphire will be smaller than a 1ct diamond with a identical cut. Just something to keep in mind.

~Justin

 

[frettybride]

You're budget will allow you to get a beautiful ring!

The size stone you can get will REALLY depend on color, clarity, brilliance/opacity, treatments...I mean, you could get an 8 ct opaque stone for $300 if you liked the look of it (http://www.gemsny.com/sapphires/8.12-Carat-Oval-Sapphire-S729OV/), or you could get something smaller, brighter, and sparklier. If you haven't seen natural sapphires in person I'd highly recommend it -- you might be surprised by what you do and don't like!

If you like the precision/custom cutters and happen to want a yellow sapphire, I saw this Montana yellow sapphire from Jeff White and was kind of tempted to buy it: http://www.whitesgems.com/gems/SAP028.htm

I had a great experience with GemsNY.com. Their online pictures are pretty bad and not all their stones have respectable certification, but if you happen to live in the NYC area, they will literally take a bag of sapphires out for you in your price range and you can see what floats your boat. If you don't live in the NYC area, I would stick with the gems that have real certification (not UGL or GemsNY certs). GemsNY also has reasonably priced settings (a whole bunch under $500). For example, this looks pretty good (http://www.gemsny.com/sapphires/2.30-Carat-Oval-Sapphire-S901OV/) but I'd want to see it in person (also I don't know how important certification is to you).

However, search "sapphire ring" and see what other PSers have used! I don't think many people here use GemsNY so I'm a total outlier.