I'm nervous about ring for her
I'm looking for where to buy a ring and found this (redacted spam). What do you think of it? Whether you are deceived there or have you heard something about it? Tell me, you've already gone through this. I'm nervous!
Some unique items there but overall looks kind of cheap. Online engagement ring shopping should be done through James Allen or Blue Nile. Those are the two respected, large, strong service, good prices dealers.
Blue Nile worked great for me.
Assuming you've eschewed the advice of Eddie Braverman on marriage, I wouldn't ask any of these judgmental fuckers about rings, hell I'd be afraid to show you guys the ring I bought, much less the dress shoes I wear to work.
Joking aside, congrats
If "ring for her" => engagement, it really depends on your fiance-to-be, but most prefer the old-fashioned diamond. If that's the case, here's what worked for me:
Once you have a sense of what you're looking for, buy a plane ticket to NY and go to the Diamond District on 47th St. Buy a loose stone and setting, and pay to have the ring put together. Your budget will translate to much higher Cut and Carat than if you buy retail.
If you need more advice, check out https://www.theplunge.com/</a">The Plunge
Don't do it.
I got my wife's ring through this site: www.77diamonds.com
It's as close as you can get to wholesale prices and you get to fully customize everything.
Colour
Unless you’re dealing with a diamond specialist, it’s hugely unlikely that anyone will be able to tell the difference between D, E and F colour with the naked eye. Consequently, if you want to save yourself a bit of money, you can go as low as F colour without a material impact on the diamond.
Clarity
VVS2 (Very Very Slightly included band 2) is as included as you should allow the diamond to be in my opinion. These imperfections will still be somewhat hard for a trained gemologist to spot under a microscope, so to the naked eye they will be fine. At a push you could go down to VS1 (Very Slightly included band 1).
Carat
This is the last thing you should be thinking about in terms of diamond quality, however, you probably still want to ensure that the diamond will look a good size on your fiancé’s finger. Not too big, not too small. You can use the following site for this. https://www.diamdb.com/diamond/1ct-round/
Cut
This is probably the most important point in terms of light performance. If you want a round cut, I offer the following advice. Go through each of the certificates and get a diamond which is cut within these proportions:
Table: 54% to 57% Crown: 34% to 35% Pavilion; 40.6% to 41% Depth: 61% to 62.5% Girdle: Thin to Medium
These are the proportion of what is deemed to be a "super excellent" cut (see google images for a table outlining the above), but you cannot filter for these since GIA do not have such a ranking. A diamond cut to these proportions would fall within GIA's “excellent” cut grade, but so would other inferior diamonds, hence the need to manually go through the certificates to ensure that the diamond confirms to these dimensions.
Once you have found one that conforms to these dimensions, you can use the Holloway cut adviser to help you establish what the diamond will look like in real life based on its measurements.
https://www.pricescope.com/tools/hca/
Ideally you should be looking for everything to be "excellent", but this will be extremely hard to achieve, so if you manage to get "very good" for the visual size to weight ratio (aka spread) and "excellent" for everything else (light return, fire and scintillation), you can more or less rest assured that you are getting a very well cut diamond that will have great visuals.
If you are buying a diamond on the more expensive end of the spectrum, they may also be able to provide you with hearts, arrows and ASET images, but you'd need to contact them and ask for it. This is the only true way to test for quality of cut, but if you stick to the above measurements and the Holloway cut adviser results you’ll most likely be OK anyway.
Other
You’re taking quite a risk if you get anything other than a round cut or a princess cut without her explicit request.
I would strongly advise that you look only for diamonds with a GIA certificate.
Unless you plan on getting a perfect diamond in every respect, do not expect it to hold its value. You’re going to be paying 15-20k for a perfect one at 1 carat though.
If you are planning on getting something at the higher price mark, you may wish to consider arranging a holiday to get it so you can reclaim VAT etc.
Unless she has fat fingers, and maybe even if she has fat fingers, I would recommend the delicacy cut. It will make the ring seem more elegant and the diamond appear relatively larger.
Good luck.
Go ring shopping with her first. That way you can get something you at least know she likes. Then go to a pawn shop and purchase someone else’s broke dreams.
Thank you for choosing WSO, a group of undergraduate sophomores who have never kissed a girl will be here to assist you. Hope you have a wonderful day.
Don't do it. You must be able to inspect the selection for flaws on the spot. My friend's engagement ring was ordered online. The ring was of a beautiful unique design, but the diamond came with a flaw (a small dark spot at the bottom). Her guy being a regular joe, had no idea it wasn't supposed to be there. The whole episode turned into a mess.
Save yourself the headache. Pick the style you like on the website, and try finding something similar at a branded local jeweler. They're so desperate for business they'll help you any way they can. And take a VERY close look at each ring.
Cheers
First learn from her friends/family what she is looking for
Then research on blue nile to get a price estimate of what a ring like that would cost
Then show up to a diamond dealer / jewelry store with cash on hand. Diamonds are very opaque when it comes to pricing so unless you are familiar with the industry or have bought many diamonds in the past, the sales person will know you have no idea what you are doing.
The first thing you will be asked is what your budget is. No matter what you say, they will automatically set that price and be selling you diamonds worth much less. Be very opaque back to them “idk could be anywhere from a few thousand to 50k” or something like that.
If they hammer you, give them a number at most that is 75% of your budget, but less is more.
Remember, no one can tell the difference between a D and an EF.
Diamonds price better just under a carat.. so .9 1.9, 2.9 etc.
Also, unless your fiancé is a jeweler, she will never know the difference in a perfect cut diamond and one that is not. a wide cut diamond, which is not perfect in jewelers terms, will have a larger surface area and appear larger.
Clarity of vs and up is typically safe.
When you finally find the one SHE wants, whatever price they tell you haggle then down hard. Mention you have cash on hand, point out all the inventory they have sitting around, remind them they could get a 100% cash sale TODAY.
Push back on them about everything. I wish I did this when I bought my wife’s engagement ring. I did do it when I got her a wedding gift, and worked remarkably well. Got close to 25% off the first price they offered.
some advice
1) just ask her sister/mom/friends what she wants, don't go into it blindly. There are even ways to find out from her without asking if you pay attention (i.e. if shes talking about how she loves/hates one of her friends rings, ask why). Bring the sister/mom/friends with you to the jeweler too for extra help.
2) ask around for jeweler recommendations, preferably from a older friend/coworker who has good opinions and has bought a lot of jewelery (engagement rings, wedding bands, anniversary rings/gifts). It should not be hard at all to find a reputable jeweler near you.
3) as others have pointed out, there are certain areas you can cut back on to save a lot of money. I personally focused on color and carat to get a nice sized very clear/colorless diamond and didnt really give a shit about clarity (there are a bunch of little imperfections you can only see with a microscope, nobody can tell just by looking).
4) MOST IMPORTANT don't feel pressured by friends or marketing to pay a lot. I was totally planning to spend $15-$20k because I had the savings for it and it seemed like what all my friends were paying. I ended up finding a ring in the store that her sister and I both really liked that was only $9,000 and went for it. My fiance loves the ring and i am SO HAPPY I have that extra $6-11k in the bank, especially now that we've been engaged for a while and nobody even asks to look at the ring anymore.
female here. I just don't get it. Who cares? If the guy is a gem, then this is all just pomp and circumstance.
Granted, I'm a banker myself, and don't always understand other women's rationale. I just wouldn't care nearly as much as I care about the guy having the qualities I value than whatever ring he buys.