Settings and ring styles: answers from a diamond dealer

Hi all! I see a lot of posts here with people looking for yellow gold settings with white gold or platinum prongs. My recommendation? Skip the white prongs. Diamonds are so highly refractive that the white prong won't significantly affect the color anyway, and having the ring cast from one piece of solid metal makes it not only more durable, but more cohesive and elegant looking (IMHO).

So, if you're debating putting white prongs on a yellow gold ring, I'd reconsider. Just go with all yellow for a clean, timeless look.

If you go with this stone, it's vitally important that the pave stones be chosen to match the color. Otherwise it will be very obvious and make the stone look even more yellow. Unfortunately, pave stones that dark are very difficult to find, so it's a challenge for any jeweler - especially one who isn't in a major market.

But don't compromise on this! Mismatched stones make the whole ring look amateurish and "stapled together" rather than organic and whole.

That's annoying - but not at all unusual. Think of it this way: imagine how small those little diamonds in the halo are. Now consider how small the prongs that hold them have to be. It just doesn't take much to bend one of those, and the smallest knock against a desk, door knob, steering wheel, etc. can do it. Then two days later a stone falls out and you're wondering what happened.

Don't stress about this. Just ask the jeweler to replace the missing stones. It should be either free or inexpensive.

That's my concern. Many times the light yellow stones look totally washed out loose, and the settings boost the color significantly. It's hard to judge the stone from this video because I can't say if I'm looking at a good stone or a good setting.

If the 8ct looks good on its own merits, I'd lean that way. 61k is a good price for the intense, but medium FL is a big problem for fancy yellow. It will fade significantly in the sun.

Jewelers make mountings like this so a valuable stone can be easily moved from one setting to another. This way the wearer can have a diamond halo ring one day, drop earrings with rubies the next, and a diamond and sapphire pendant the day after that, all using the same stone.

Edit: of course, the downside is that sometimes you lose the stone! When I make pieces like this, I always use some kind of safety mechanism to prevent this.

This is one area where saving money will often cost you in the long run. Most of the cost of a setting is labor. If you only pay for cheap labor, that's what you'll get. There's a huge difference between what you see online (typically mass produced overseas with the cheapest, least skilled laborers possible) and a quality piece made by a master craftsman. For a ring that someone you love will wear every day forever, it's worth a few extra bucks to make it durable and strong. Plus, it's important to match the pave stones (color, cut, etc.) to the center stone, and if you get a pre-fab online setting, that's not possible.

Yes... But this gets a little tricky. JA doesn't custom make any settings - their settings are mass-produced overseas. That means they can't color-match the diamonds in the halo to the center. I think that's a very important step, since a mis-match in color there is very obvious, and really cheapens the look of the ring. For this reason, I always recommend that halo settings be custom made to match the center stone. Doing so doesn't cost any more than buying the pre-made one anyway, so there's just no reason not to do it.

Where are you located?

OK, at $1,500 you have a few options.

1. Get a setting like the one you posted, but with a "temporary stone" - CZ, white sapphire, etc. That way she get a setting she likes, and you can replace the stone with a real diamond later as budget allows.

1. Get a diamond, and put it in a simpler/cheaper setting. At $1,500, you'll probably be around 1/2 carat or so. You can put that in a simple solitaire, and upgrade the setting later when you can. Potentially, you could upgrade both the stone and setting in the future as funds become available.

1. Get a very inexpensive gold band (no stone at all), and wait until you can afford to get her what you really want to get her. Really, there's no shame in that at all - you're acting as a good and responsible husband should!

If you're mounting in a halo, I really recommend against JA. In order for the ring to look cohesive, the stones in the halo must be color matched to the center stone. If the little stones are too white, it kills the look of the center, and if they're too yellow, the ring is also compromised. JA mass-produces their settings overseas, and it's a "one size fits all" approach, so proper color matching isn't possible.

Lots of people make halo settings. Can you post a link of the one you like?

Where are you located?

Yes, shared prong settings are a bit more secure. This has to do with the technique used to set them. Pave stones are often set with lost wax casting, which saves labor costs but isn't the most secure. Shared prong settings are generally set by hand, so more attention is paid to each stones.

In the end, though, you're going to lose stones either way. It's just a fact of life with these designs. Just be mentally prepared for that, and remember it's really no big deal. Just enjoy your ring, and remember, a ship in the harbor is safe, but that's not what ships are for!

Unfortunately if the design is delicate this can happen no matter how well made it is. If your design includes very small diamonds in delicate settings, the prongs holding them are super small, which means it doesn't take much to bend them. So your future wife can inadvertently knock her hand against a desk, doorknob, etc., not even realize she did it, and slightly move a tiny prong. Then two days later a stone falls out and she has no idea why.

I can't tell you how many times I've had clients swear they're super careful with their rings, and there's no way they could have bent a prong. Then I look at it under magnification and it looks like a train wreck.

The good news is that repairing rings with lost stones like this is very cheap and easy. I usually replace them for free for my clients.

There's really no such thing as a "used" stone in the industry. It's not like a car that has wear and tear on it.

As for jewelers not wanting to sell just a setting, that's not universally the case, but it's not uncommon. The reason is liability exposure. Let me give you an extreme example. Let's say you walk into a jewelry store with a diamond worth $500,000, and you want to buy their $3,000 setting (on which they're making maybe a $1,000 profit). You want to set your stone, right? But for the jeweler, what if the stone chips or breaks in setting? What if the store is robbed while they're working on it? What if it gets lost? The jeweler takes on a $500k liability to make $1k. Not a great risk/reward. So many (most) won't do it.

Sorry I'm late to this post, but just in case... I don't recommend buying the stone and setting separately. You're better off having ingredients one single source, so that if there is any issue (especially a mismatch between the center stone and the halo stones, which would look awful), you have one person to complain to, and it's one person's responsibility to make it right.

There are lots of better ways to buy something like this than BE or retail!

Yes, they're doing you a favor by swapping the stones. It's true that the diamonds are a bit more valuable, but the labor will offset that and these small stones really aren't as valuable as you may think.

However, by making this change you are potentially opening a Pandora's box of problems. This is a machine made mass produced ring, and it is not a high quality setting. Once you alter it, it will be weaker and more susceptible to stones falling out, etc. I can practically guarantee you'll have problems with it in the future.

For a long time, "halos" have been very popular. People love setting a ring of small stones around a center, to make it look bigger and to enhance its overall appearance. Stuff like this:

https://www.facebook.com/ConciergeDiamonds/photos/pb.467061483325815.-2207520000.1418947541./894159050616054/?type=3&theater

Also, rose gold is extremely popular right now, and looks to stay that way for a while.

As for my favorite trend, I try not to play favorites! I make a lot of different styles of jewelry, and as a "father," I love all my "children!"