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Shiny_Rock
- Joined
- Sep 12, 2006
- Messages
- 153
My partner and I are going to get engaged soon, and we are each going to have a colored stone engagement ring. Exciting!!!
We live in New Zealand, and I recently visited my family in the US. When I told my British mother we were planning on getting engaged, she very kindly offered me this family ring:
It belonged to my great-great-great grandmother, so that makes me Generation 6 in my family to wear it. It seems to be from the 1870s - 1880s. My mother had recently received it from my grandmother. "But it's so delicate, I never wear it." A resize during its 140-year life had, unfortunately, removed any hallmarks.
I hadn't even been hankering for a sapphire, but, between the flashing beauty of it and the incredible family history, I was entranced. The side diamonds, old mine cuts, have a lovely candlelight waver to them. I did notice that, when I received it, the sapphire was scratched and worn and needed a repolish, and the prongs Needed Work. These pictures show the ring before the prong rework but after a center stone repolish.
After visiting my family, my travels took me to Philadelphia. I lived there for ten years and worked part-time for a jeweler for three years during that time. And one thing was certain: it would be a lot easier to get the sapphire repolished in Philadelphia than it would in New Zealand. After a web search and a phone call or two, I stopped by http://www.fgsgems.com/fgsgems/ on Jeweler's Row. Frank Schaeffer is a great communicator and I felt confident working with him. I dropped my ring off with him and his crew at 10:30 AM and picked it up at 3:30 the same day, vastly improved. They also kindly gave me the measurements of the main stone - about 6.75 by 5.7 mm, a little over a carat, cushion cut - and said that it was an untreated Ceylon sapphire.
In my day on Jeweler's Row, I checked out gemstones at several places. Frank's place is a gemological candy store (he's got some nice spinels too) but I shopped around to be sure. Shipping to New Zealand is spendy and this was going to be my best chance to find a stone for my dear partner's engagement ring. My partner had said that he'd like something green, but not too big - no more than 5 mm, preferably 4 mm. We talked about emeralds, the classic green stone. I looked at emeralds, tourmalines, and tsavorites, and sent a list of options to my partner. Frank happened to have a handsome cushion-cut tsavorite, 4.8 mm across and 3.4 mm deep, that had serious sparkle and color, and that was the one he picked. Unfortunately these photos do the stone no justice whatsoever - I have failed to capture its cool, bright green flash. It's my first time photographing gemstones, sorry.
Why, yes, his hands are a lot bigger than mine!
Right now the tsavorite is with a jeweler here in Wellington, being set into an 18k rose gold ring for him. The same jeweler is also reviving the Victorian ring for me. (This isn't cheap - 10+ prongs are being redone.) We expect to get the finished rings in mid-September, and I'll post another update then.
Thanks to everyone for posting their own projects! Especially the guys - we went through the men's "Show Us Your Bling" forums here with great thoroughness.
We live in New Zealand, and I recently visited my family in the US. When I told my British mother we were planning on getting engaged, she very kindly offered me this family ring:
It belonged to my great-great-great grandmother, so that makes me Generation 6 in my family to wear it. It seems to be from the 1870s - 1880s. My mother had recently received it from my grandmother. "But it's so delicate, I never wear it." A resize during its 140-year life had, unfortunately, removed any hallmarks.
I hadn't even been hankering for a sapphire, but, between the flashing beauty of it and the incredible family history, I was entranced. The side diamonds, old mine cuts, have a lovely candlelight waver to them. I did notice that, when I received it, the sapphire was scratched and worn and needed a repolish, and the prongs Needed Work. These pictures show the ring before the prong rework but after a center stone repolish.
After visiting my family, my travels took me to Philadelphia. I lived there for ten years and worked part-time for a jeweler for three years during that time. And one thing was certain: it would be a lot easier to get the sapphire repolished in Philadelphia than it would in New Zealand. After a web search and a phone call or two, I stopped by http://www.fgsgems.com/fgsgems/ on Jeweler's Row. Frank Schaeffer is a great communicator and I felt confident working with him. I dropped my ring off with him and his crew at 10:30 AM and picked it up at 3:30 the same day, vastly improved. They also kindly gave me the measurements of the main stone - about 6.75 by 5.7 mm, a little over a carat, cushion cut - and said that it was an untreated Ceylon sapphire.
In my day on Jeweler's Row, I checked out gemstones at several places. Frank's place is a gemological candy store (he's got some nice spinels too) but I shopped around to be sure. Shipping to New Zealand is spendy and this was going to be my best chance to find a stone for my dear partner's engagement ring. My partner had said that he'd like something green, but not too big - no more than 5 mm, preferably 4 mm. We talked about emeralds, the classic green stone. I looked at emeralds, tourmalines, and tsavorites, and sent a list of options to my partner. Frank happened to have a handsome cushion-cut tsavorite, 4.8 mm across and 3.4 mm deep, that had serious sparkle and color, and that was the one he picked. Unfortunately these photos do the stone no justice whatsoever - I have failed to capture its cool, bright green flash. It's my first time photographing gemstones, sorry.
Why, yes, his hands are a lot bigger than mine!
Right now the tsavorite is with a jeweler here in Wellington, being set into an 18k rose gold ring for him. The same jeweler is also reviving the Victorian ring for me. (This isn't cheap - 10+ prongs are being redone.) We expect to get the finished rings in mid-September, and I'll post another update then.
Thanks to everyone for posting their own projects! Especially the guys - we went through the men's "Show Us Your Bling" forums here with great thoroughness.
) and setting, and its family history makes it even more precious. Besides feeling your relatives at your side when you wear it, it must be a big thrill that it is not a run-of-the-mill e-ring -- something special.
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