Newbie help, please!

[acupunk]

Hi, I'm new as far as posting here, but I have been reading for a while. I want to buy my first pair of diamond stud earrings and I'm not sure the best route to go. I'm looking for something good and comfortable for every day wear. I was thinking about .8 ctw? Does that seem decent for smallish earlobes? I have a solitaire diamond pendant from Tiffany's that's .68 ct, so I'd want it to look good together. Anyway, I was looking on Whiteflash since most of you seem to like the place. Unless I'm using the site wrong, I didn't see any matching sets that were better than an H colour and about SI clarity? Is there something about WF that makes an H look good? In a "normal" diamond, I can definitely tell the difference between a G and an H. Also, SI will often look cloudy to me in a side by side comparison. I know it sounds crazy, but a gemologist I know calls me "eagle eye". There's a really nice pair of .72 ctw diamonds at a local place in F-G/VS1 in "very good-excellent" cut, but they're not certified and they're set in WG, which I'd want to upgrade to platinum. He wants $1200 (upgrade would be another $200). WF is significantly more, which I'm willing to pay if it's worth it.

My point is that I'd like something really nice for a good price. I'm leaning towards WF or used Tiffany's if I can find it and be sure it's authentic, but I think I'd want slightly better WF than what's offered unless the experts here convince me that the ACA thing makes up for it somehow? I've never seen them in person. Or any better ideas? Thank you in advance!

 

[mcosme]

You can also try brian gavin - si1 will be fine if they are eye clean
http://www.briangavindiamonds.com/diamond_pair_comparisions/compared_diamond_details/AGS-104049771046/CAGS-104062277136

If they're not certified you don't really know what you're getting.

 

[Christina...]

ACA's are one of the best cut diamonds in the world. Ideally cut diamonds look whiter, brighter, larger and hide inclusions better than a less ideal cut stone. They also have ideal optically symmetry, they are true hearts and arrows stones. All of this means that these diamonds perform better than 99% of all diamonds being sold today. That's pretty tough to beat and why the are priced higher than some other stones. Do you need this level of performance for earrings? I don't know, that's up to you, but IMO opinion if you are looking for a truly ideal cut stone then you should not rule these out.

You might also consider Brian Gavin Diamonds. His signature line is every bit as beautiful and he may have a larger selection of what you are looking for. Good Old Gold also carries HA stones and likely would also be able to find you a matching set.

I think that you need to decide what level of precision you need or want. There is likely a huge difference between the stones offered by the vendors that I mentioned and the uncerted stones being offered by your jeweler. That doesn't mean that the uncerted diamonds aren't beautiful or that they won't serve the same purpose at a smaller price, it's just unlikely that they are in the same ballpark as the vendors mentioned. It's also very difficult to determine if they are being sold to you at a fair price since you have no idea what the actual grading is on them, making it impossible to do any comparison shopping.

You might also check out James Allen

 

[acupunk]

Very helpful, thank you! I'll check out the others you mentioned. So if they're "whiter and brighter", then are all of their SIs eye clean and are the H ones pretty darn colourless?

 

[acupunk]

Oh, and does anyone know the difference between the Brian Gavin select vs. signature martini settings? There's a significant difference in price, but is the signature really that much nicer in some way?