RBC earrings

[Manks]

Hello All

I am considering buying a pair of RBC diamond studs for my wife. However, it has been an expensive year (E-ring, wedding, new house plus loads more), added to which she WILL lose one at some point, so I do not want to spend a kings ransom.

She has very fair skin, blonde hair and small ear lobes, so I am thinking I need to keep the colour reasonably good, but size does not need to be huge.

Questions:

1. How coloured do you think I should go, given her skin tone?

2. How matched does a pair of stones need to be for earrings?

3. Am I better off buying the stones separately and having them made into earrings, or buy a matched pair, or just buy the earrings ready made?

4. Do you think that .25Cwt stones will look reasonable on a small ear (think 12 year old child sized ears!), or should I go larger?

I am thinking of going for a prong setting.

Any other thoughts about diamond studs gratefully received.

 

[valeria101]

The lightest skin color can't posibly be colorless... I would not worry about that.

Small studs are great day-in and day-out earrings. I do not think you can possibly go wrong with those.

Almost everything here is just a matter of taste, of course. For once, the matching will show very, very well only in the jewelry box, not when the earrings are worn. But then, it must matter how those look in the gift box, right? It shouldn't cost significantly more to have a very well matched pair.

It is yet another story what "well matched" means. To me, that's one grade of color and/or clarity and well-matched cut. It shouldn't be hard to have ideal cut rounds matched for cut. I would leave it to the seller to do this.

And yes, definitely buy the stones separately

Unless you find a shop that will sell preset studs in this size with certs and tests of brilliance in toe. The costs of settings is usually very little of the total for these so it makes sense - as far as I ca tell - to be able to know precisely how the cost is broken down.

Just my 0.2, of course.

Do you have a certain pair in mind?

 

[wonka27]

Manks -

We are in the same boat dude. I'm trying to save for a house, but yet in the past month I've bought an engagement diamond, diamond studs, and diamond pendant for my g/f. The studs & pendant arrive Thursday and the ering diamond will be set in the next week or so. All said and done, the experience is setting me back about 5K. She is worth that and more though, so I don't mind.

My budget was 5K total. What I did was went with a little smaller ering diamond (.79 H SI1) for $3100. I decided with the leftover money, I'd get her the studs and pendant as a present. She knows all about this stuff now...and is estatic with the thought of getting four diamonds instead of one.

Anyway, I'm rambling on about my stuff, and want to comment to you. The skin tone thing I have no clue on. I think if a jeweler knows you want to put together a pair of earrings, they will do their best to find two stones that will be within a color grade and clarity grade of each other and have very similar diameters.

One thing to consider. I found in my experience (in which I bought loose stones from a pricescope vendor and had them set them), the settings can get costly in the process. It seems like your typical push back basket settings will go for around $100-$200 plus a setting fee. So whoever you work with, make sure you get that info upfront when you tell them what you want to do. You might say...oh great, those ideal cut F SI1 .50 cttw. studs cost $800, but then you might as well tack on the other $200+ and possibly shipping. I'm not trying to say don't do it, just be aware there is more cost to it than just the diamonds if you go loose.

BTW, I got her .47 cttw. (.235 ct ea.) studs, and she is thrilled to death to be getting them. I guess it all depends on the girl. If this is out of nowhere...I'm sure she will appreciate anything you get her.

If you want any details on my project, PM me. I'd be happy to fill you in further on what I did.

Good luck!

Jon

 

[Manks]

Valeria

The thing with the skin tome is just that I have a feeling a whiter stone looks better on faor skin than a more coloured one. Though I take your point - even white caucasian people aren't as white as a K grade diamond!

John

You are echoing what I have been thinking. I suspect that although I'd get better stones buying loose, the all-up cost will be greater. I have no proof of that though. Its just my feeling that if I buy some ready made up (though still decent stones), the cost is likely to be sharper than if the job has to be assembled.

 

[wonka27]

Manks -

I think you are right. I think the major issue is what kind of quality cut do you want in your earrings. I went for the ideal cuts because, well just because this is what I've learned here and I think she is worth it. Some will say you don't need as high quality in earrings as you would for an ering. The preference is ultimately yours.

I think if you want true ideal cut diamonds for earrings, you will be hard pressed to find sets together. Maybe I'm wrong, but that was the impression I got from shopping at local jewelers. They had to show me loose diamonds of a better quality, so I would have ended up doing the same thing there at an even higher cost.

One last note. If your looking in the .25 ct ea. range, it will be harder to find certed diamonds. You can, but then you pay a higher premium. I let the vendor call in uncerted diamonds and was pleased with the results. He gave them the once over and made a recommendation that I went with. Actually, the set I bought is not completely ideal. I think the crown angles are just outside of AGS Ideal proportions, but still scored around 1.0 on the HCA.

 

[Jennifer5973]

This is a very subjective decision--many combinations of size, color and clarity will yield beautiful earrings, given, of course, the cut is good or better.

Personally, 30-40 pts each is a nice size and will look proportionate to your wife's ears but still be substantial. I have earrings with 40 pt center RBS (surrounded by a "jacket" square with 5 ptrs) and they are a nice size. My ear is normal sized--for a petite ear, 30-40 would be awesome.

i think H/I/J or even K in well cut stones will face up white! And with earrings, no one sees the pavillion, which is where color can show up, even in an Ideal stone. I personally prefer the traditional low basket setting or the 3-prong martini. I also agre that working with a vendor to find 2 well-matched stones is probably the best way to go.

Good luck--I can't wait to see them.

 

[bstraszheim]

Hi Manks,

When shopping for studs I did not want anything too large, I found that around .25ct for each ear was just perfect. I am a very fair skinned person and I went with G colour. To me they look very white, but I don't think that I am particularly colour sensitive. I love them and wear them practically everyday. They go with just about everything!

From what I have read, Whiteflash has smaller size diamonds that are ACA/ H&A. I would contact them.

Good luck with your purchase! Please let us know how it turns out.

I wish you well.

Bridget

 

[Jennifer5973]

Not a great picture but may be of some help to you--center is 40 pts.

 

[Manks]

Pretty ear!

I cannot really judge your ear versus my wife's, but I am wondering whether the .4 on its own might be small.

 

[valeria101]

----------------
On 8/24/2004 9:37:37 AM Manks wrote:



Pretty ear!

I cannot really judge your ear versus my wife's, but I am wondering whether the .4 on its own might be small.
----------------

What are her current earrings like? large? Tiny?

I've been wearing a bunch of "By the Yard" earrings and simmilar types of all colors and would never get larger ones. Those are about 3-4mm wide bezel and all. I would leave the task to show off to other jewelry. My habits are just one example, but surely that Tiffany model is popular despite their tiny selves.

So, really her style should matter and nothing else.

As for availability, you will find that a few sellers even list ready-made ideal pairs (Nice Ice, GOG, Wink...). It is not very hard to match a couple on your own as long as cut specs are provided and you can always request a pair if ideals are not your thing.

On the side, I think that you may be well served by a pair of BIC RBCs even if outside that AGS0 range. These are those stones with somewhat larger tables but good HCA. It has been often mentioned here (and at least once in the Ideal Scope newsletters) that such stones do great in pendants and earrings.

Anyway, G/H-SI1, HCA<2, approx. 4-5mm (that is from 0.23 to 0.47cts apiece, so quite a range) sounds like a great receipe for stud earrings to me.

Unfortunately, there are not too many diamonds around a quarter carat with decent cut info listed. (see below)

 

[valeria101]

A search for F-H color, Vs1-Si1 clarity and weight between 0.2 and 0.3 cts, turned out the list in the picture. SI1 does not seem to make a difference in price. The step from below 30 points to near 50 definitely does

Taking a couple of fast found opetion in the order of size, here's what PS yielded:

The closest to 0.25cts pairs were at Superbcert: one pair of 0.22/G/VS1 and 0.23/G/VS2, and another made of one 0.24/E/SI1 and 0.25/D/Si1 (quite tempting these, really).

Then, there is one pair of super ideals at GOG: 0.7cts total, H/SI1, $1400

And one pair of nearly 90 points total pops up among the signature collection at DCD (0.43 H/SI1 and 0.43 G/SI1).

There were quite a few diamonds listed by Wink in this size range, and some at Nice Ice that seem to have dissapeared

Obviously, there is some premium on that cut and it is easy to find out just how much. From 1k to 2k worth it's not much of a size difference (at least for me, that is).

Hope this helps. Your idea to make up a diamond set instead of just one piece sounds exciting to this girl here, as you can see.

 

[Jennifer5973]

Thanks, manks! Ana brings up a key point--analyze your wife's general style and survey her current stock of earrings.

I think 40 points is nice if you want a substantial yet elegant look on a smaller ear (I think my ear is a "medium" ear). but 25 points would also be nice. It really comes down to your wife's style and tastes.

the "absolutes" here are the cut quality, of course,

and I am a big believer in achieving efficiencies with earrings by going H/I or even J in color and SI in clarity.

 

[bling]

i recently purchased a pair of diamond studs from DI..and they were fantastic to deal with. i wanted size this time (i have relatively small earlobes too) so i dropped in color and clarity a bit. i went with I VS2 and SI1 stones, 1.2 ctts..and they are perfect for me. they are very white and completely eye clean. I wanted to stretch the size so i opted to sacrifice in the other areas. i also bought my sister a pair of studs from GOG and again..fantastic people to deal with! Jonathan found me a great pair..they were about .80 cttw..but high in color..Es i think. they are beautiful and score top notch cut ratings! her ears are even smaller than mine, so they look quite substantial on her. I think the clarity was also SI..but again..totally eye clean.
i think anywhere between .25 and .60 (i know..big range), is a good size for any lucky gal. and she sure is lucky to be getting all this blingage in one shot..