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What one piece of jewelry unleashed the beast? Story? Pics?

LLJsmom

LLJsmom

Super_Ideal_Rock
Premium
Joined
Oct 24, 2012
Messages
12,692
Hi Fellow Blinglovers,

I was just chatting with some friends about how it all started. So, what started it for you? What one piece triggered the obsession? Give us a little back story if you want, and please post pics if you have any.

I'll start. I already have a thread about this so I'll post just one pic. Tiffany Soleste. 2.44 aquamarine. I received it for our 15 year anniversary gift. Prior to this, I only wore a 3 mm plain platinum domed band. Nothing else. No earrings, necklace or bracelet, except the time I tried on a piece for my mom and no one could get it off.

I don't wear this ring much. It sits in the safe. But it's very pretty. It will be my daughter's something-blue.
big_on_box.jpg

Hope others will share too...
 
I love that ring! Such a pretty color blue.

My piece that started it all was my mother's engagement ring that I was given when she passed away. Unfortunately it was stolen in a burglary years ago :cry:

Years ago I was in Kansas City and wanted to bring home something to remember the trip. I spotted this pretty band in an antique shop, I believe it was $350. Figured even if the diamonds weren't real the gold would be worth it. As it turns out it is 100% real, I don't wear it much because the prongs need to be re-tipped but here is a picture.

I hope others will share theirs, fun thread topic :D

image.jpeg
 
Easy.. when I was a very small child and had ADHD before there was a diagnosis ADDHDDDd ;-) we would take car rides somewhere in my parents old 57 chevy and the drives were long (3 hours) and I would get antsy, annoying and whiney, so my mother said to me, "Kate, look at Mommy's ring, see the rainbows and light?" "Turn it around in the sunglight and tell me the colors".. so I would, for hours, there it was 3 years old, my fascination with diamonds began, and never ended, so far anyway :)
 
I don't have a picture because they were stolen :angryfire:

My grandmother gave me a gorgeous pair of emerald drop style earrings for my graduation. I felt like royalty, it was certainly the nicest thing I ever owned. They were stolen by a horrible ex roommate, when I was 19. I can't prove she did it, but I know. Someday I will replicate them.
 
20 years ago I was dining in a chichi restaurant in Venice, CA.
It was night.
The room was nearly dark.
The only light source was tiny halogen bulbs in a high black ceiling.

I helplessly stared across the room at a woman hypnotizing me with a volcano of blinding flashing colors.

That woman cost me a fortune. :angryfire:
 
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I've been a jewelry nut my whole life.

When I was in 1st grade, Dad bought me a birthstone ring from a local gift shop. Just costume, with a fake baguette cut sapphire, flanked by 2 round crystals. It was adjustable, too!
I loved that ring so much!
I've been unstoppable since.
 
It was my original engagement ring! A random ebay find, back when we didn't know anything about jewelry, we didn't have a lot of money, I didn't like the engagement rings I saw everywhere, and thought that I didn't like diamonds. I saw this on ebay and fell in love. It's only an irradiated diamond and a cast replica of an antique, but I didn't know about those things back then and didn't care lol. Down the road, this ring led me to learn about antique jewelry, OECs and other old cuts. I still love this ring, it has so much sentimental value and the setting is so lovely. I'd love to have the setting re-created by a top-notch jeweler and set with a sapphire or oec. Someday!

3337499204_1fa8d4873c_o.jpg
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I've always loved jewelry but joining PS was my downfall.

Stage One - Genetics
My mom is a collector. I am a collector. And my mom was always trading things in, resetting stones and taking me to gem shows. But all of this was out of my budget (college, buying a house, raising kids...), so I happily owned items she tired of or gave to me on special occasions. But I've always loved jewelry and she always made sure I had some nice pieces while most of my purchases were mostly inexpensive or a nicer piece when I was traveling to Hong Kong on business.

Stage Two - Beads and Pearls - The collector in me starts to come out
Ever start by thinking you are helping someone and they end up opening a whole new world for you? I have an elderly neighbor who's husband passed away 7 years ago. Learning she liked to make jewelry, I took up beading to keep her company - going to her house once a week and taking her to bead shops, etc. I learned that she and her husband had been into gems and jewelry big time (she'd go to Tucson with her husband). I would be in awe of her CS pieces but figured that was totally out of my league. I started going to gem shows with her to buy beads and she'd introduce me to her vendors and due to her love of pearls, I started collecting pearl jewelry - lots of it - nothing real high end but I have pieces to go with just about anything and still love wearing them. (Oh and being a collector, I have enough beading stuff that I had to buy furniture to keep it all. I call it my "retirement fund" since I don't have time to seriously get into it but it will give me something to do on a smaller retirement income)

Stage Three - Paraibas - my first real obsession
At one show, my same neighbor is talking with one of her vendors for a long time and while I wait, I kill time looking for anything nice that I MIGHT be able to afford. My eyes immediately stopped at the paraiba cluster ring in my profile pic. The stones were so surreal that I thought maybe they weren't natural (i.e. affordable) so I asked "Are those real?" Then I learned about Brazilian paraibas and their very real price tag, lol. Over the course of the next year or two, I bought a couple of not too expensive large rings influenced by my same neighbor. But I longed for a paraiba ring - searching up and down for one I could afford - and eventually, the vendor came way down in price so I could have it. For me, that was it...my holy grail..and my running joke became "I don't want anything else unless there is a larger paraible I can afford". One day, our local jeweler told me he had a 3 1/2 carat paraiba ring for me in my price range as he bought it off some lady who needed the money. It wasn't as saturated and didn't have the glow of my little ones and the price was only $2000 which led me to...

Stage Four - PS Unleashes the "I need more" Beast
I joined to ask if the big paraiba could be real (PSers told me to send it to AGL - it ended up being a paraiba-type cuprian). While here, I saw lots of posts and pictures of another glowy stone - mahenge spinel - and had to have one. Which led me to LT, then FB, met some friends and vendors...the next stone/piece and then the next and...
You know the rest :)
 
Don't laugh, this is a true story. When I was a little girl living in the ghetto, this man who wore fancy suits and smelled good would come visit my grandfather. This man would sit me on his lap and let me play with a ring on his pinky finger that housed a diamond as big as his knuckle. I remember the pretty flashes of color on the stone and it marked me for the future. When I got older, I realized that the man was the don of the local mafia family. LOL.

Flash forward to my twenties and I acquired a modest oval cut diamond for my 1st engagement ring -- 1/3 carat but a sparkler. In my thirties, I was having dinner in a restaurant and across the room from me sat a woman wearing a round brilliant that was the biggest I've seen outside a museum. I looked at my oval, looked at her RB and something snapped.

Visions of gems the size of sugar plums stopped dancing in my head throughout the rest of my 1st marriage. Along came hubs #2 and although I was fascinated by diamonds, I preferred colored stones; found Pricescope quite by accident and the rest is history.
 
I wouldn't say it was a particular jewellery piece or anything like that - but I used to google anything and everything when I worked as part of a 24/7 emergency team that used to deal with electricity and gas emergencies and what initially grabbed my attention was the story of the infamous sapphire mine in Kashmir, followed by the story of the 2000kg (from memory) of Alexandrite with fine colour change mined in the Ural Mountains as a by-product of emerald mining.

The next thing that happened was finding PS and as of right now I am a relatively-new trade member, I had no idea that I was going to end up where I am but it sure has been a pretty awesome journey! :mrgreen:
 
When I saw the Crown Jewels. I was in my early 20's and was hooked.
 
My uncle married into a family that owned sapphire mines at Inverell in Australia. My grandfather had a huge old tin (much like a large coffee can) full of tiny tailings of sapphires and other gemstone rough from their mines, so when I was a small child I would pester him to give me the can of pretty tiny rocks to play with and I would wash the stones and sort them just so I could see the rough sapphires and other gemstones glittering rainbows of beautiful colours in the sunlight.

I've been a gemstone, rock and crystal hoarder since then and two decades later, I married into a family that own the largest privately owned rock, crystal, mineral, fossil, and gemstone museum (with a small shop) in Australia. My sister in law just opened a second larger shop (with no museum).

And my father is a metal artist, it's lucky I love it because I'm surrounded by jewellery, gemstones and rocks.
 
I'm obsessed thanks to hunting for my engagement ring - I didn't like the MRBs available locally but didn't know why until I saw OECs and old mine cuts online and it clicked - flowery facets and chunky flashes :love:.
I finally found a ring that made my heart sing and got to Pricescope through wanting to learn more about old cuts.
And now I just love looking at pretty sparklers and all the incredible jewellery people post on here while planning what I'll upgrade to in about 10 years (or whenever I get over feeling awkward about having a diamond that's bigger than anyone in my social circle or friends :lol:)
 
This is a great question LLJsmom. I'm not entirely sure. It's a toss up between my grandmother's old cut engagement ring and my mom's black opal from Cartier. I sort of became aware of them at the same time. What stayed with me though was how romantic my dad was in getting this ring for my mom. Despite her protests because it was a lot of money for them but he wanted her to have something almost as beautiful and amazing as their love and while it obviously cannot touch that it is a breathtaking ring.

But I was also so drawn to the chunky facets and gorgeous colors that my grandmother's ring just seemed to glow with and I had never seen anything like it at the time. And so I'm going to say both rings were the start of my obsession re all things bling.

However my dh was the real catalyst because before he entered my life I wasn't into wearing bling but just admiring a few amazing pieces. But then he and I started dating and he started buying me bling and well a while new appreciation for jewelry began and the story continues. And in fact he found PS for me when I wanted to reset (again) & that didn't help lol.

Sadly I can't find the few photos I had of my grandmother's old cut ER so I can't include that here. And you guys have seen static pics of my opal too many times but will try adding this new perspective of it.


https://instagram.com/p/BTluQzZAr_5/
 
When I was a child, I lived with my aunt and uncle and my mom. They purchased a house together. My aunt was a crazy smart and was one of the first programmers in the space industry in CA. She had to go to work in the middle of the night to program the computers because what she did was top secret. So she was home with me during the day when I was small. She wore a plain 2 carat solitaire in platinum with a platinum matching band. She would let me play with it and try it on. She always told me that she had promised it to her other niece and when she passed on it did go to her. She always told me that everything else she owned would go to me and I would be able to buy my own. Her stone was flawless and of high color I do believe. Well, the latter never happened due to my uncle marrying a devious woman who funneled everything to her children and grandchildren. Didn't matter though because I married my own prince who bought me my own. If I could go back, I would gladly trade for her diamond. It was so sentimental to me.
 
The antique pearl & diamond ring in my avatar. It belong to my Great Aunt & I coveted it from around the age of 5. She wore it ALL the time & I would always try it on whenever I saw her. The flashes from the diamonds are mesmerising! It dates from between 1895 - 1905 but most the the hallmarks are gone. She passed away in 2014 only 6 months from her 100th Birthday, and had left me this as a beautiful gift. It needs remaking as the basket underneath has some snapped areas & Caysie has kindly agreed to do it for me. It is currently too vulnerable to wear & I am saving to send it over to her. But it definitely set me on the path to sparkle addiction - I have ogled jewellery since I can remember!
 
Great stories and pictures!

My colored stone obsession started with my first sapphire. It was a 6x4mm oval and that royal blue color glowed. My diamond obsession began with my 1/2 carat AGS0E; I didn't know how great a diamond could look. After getting my diamond out in sunlight I was kind of shocked it went dark - fire and sparkles were still there but I didn't expect the darkness which is how I found PS. PS of course led me to bigger pieces of jewelry to trying new things.

saph ring.JPG ringpinksony2.jpg
 
HI:

My Mother's faux jewellery. And she always had a matching set (or suite). Oh and her 10mm wide brushed yellow gold wedding band. To this day I (still) LOVE LOVE LOVE yellow gold.

cheers--Sharon
 
IMG_0054.JPG IMG_0053.JPG This is the ring that did it for me: Mia Farrow wore it in "The Great Gatsby" (1974). All the jewelry is from Cartier.
 
As a child I was mesmerized by my young uncle's beautiful fiancée's solitaire engagement ring. It was less than half a carat but it sparkled. She noticed me ogling it and let me try it on once. Since then I knew I loved diamonds.
Fast forward to my teens and I got a job in a tiny jewelry store in my small home town. The summers were very slow and the owner would help pass the time by showing me what he'd bought and what he'd make. I saw some unset diamonds, rubies, and amethysts that were spell binding. I learned so much from him. i haven't lived in my hometown in almost 40 yrs and working there is one of my fondest memories.
I love, love, love beautiful jewellery. Wish I had a budget to allow for more of it. Alas, a (pricescope) girl can dream.
 
I just joined here abut a month ago but I believe I may qualify as a ps nut already. I live in Texas and storms here get pretty bad. Tonight we had a doozy. It was raining like mad, winds blowing so hard our trampoline blew over and trees were uprooted. I was so stressed about the power and network being out, not because my family of 6 (3 young kids, husband, and Labrador) were in the powder room waiting for the storm to pass -I was afraid someone would get to a loupe troop listing while I was not connected! Thankfully the storm passed, the network came back up and I got the ring! I literally bought a ring 10 minutes after a tornado! I can't get the link to
https://loupetroop.com/listings/bands/7-stone-rose-cut-diamond-ring
 
CEG, Welcome to Pricescope. You are a true Pricescoper!
 
My obsession started in elementary school and never stopped. I know my mom had the bug too, but really all she ever had was a few gold pieces and no diamonds. My paternal grandmother always, always wore brooches and costume jewelry. My oldest daughter is just like me, and has already bought herself a small OEC (.44) and a beautiful white sapphire handmade artisan ring and endless other bits and pieces.
 
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