Wedding Ring Buyer Beware, Seven Steps to Take to Avoid Disaster
As beautiful as a delicate and thin ring is, it may end up breaking your heart. With more maintenance than a more sturdily built ring, the kinds of problems that crop up with a poorly made ring are many.
Wedding Ring Buyer Beware
There are a lot of knockoff jewelry pieces—lightweight replicas of famous and beautiful designs—sitting in jewelry store cases on planet Earth. Be careful, and make sure you don’t end up owning one of them!
Seven Steps to Take to Protect Yourself From Poorly Made Wedding Rings
1. Examine all jewelry under magnification. Request a loupe from the jeweler. If they don’t have one, walk away.
2. Check other rings of similar design. Compare and look for the one with more gold and a solidly made design.
3. Feel the difference in weights. See if one ring feels heavier than another. Too thin a ring will drop diamonds.
4. Question the style. For example, will the design you like, protect your center diamond?
5. Pay special attention to the way the diamonds are set. Some setting styles are more lasting.
6. For everyday wear try to chose settings that don’t share prongs.
7. Make sure the prongs are substantial and all the gemstones are set neatly.
It’s Amazing What You See Under Magnification
Ensure that the prongs hold onto the diamonds. Some prongs are slightly too short or too thin to do the best job of protecting your gemstones from daily wear.
Eight Things to Look For in That Ring With a Loupe
- Look at the prongs holding the center gemstone. Make sure they go over the outer edge and hold the diamond.
- Are the four or six prongs even in length?
- Do the prongs cover the gemstone evenly? Avoid settings where one or more the the prongs are too close the the edge of the gemstone and not over the outer edge of the gemstone.
- Are the settings thick enough to protect the gemstone? Look at a number of engagement rings. Compare daily wear with occasional wear rings. Daily wear prongs should be more substantial.
- Are the side gemstone settings neatly and evenly done?
- Does each prong-set gemstone have four prongs? Or does it share prongs with its neighbor? Shared prongs are more problematic.
- Does the balance of the ring have enough gold/metal at the base?
- Do the diamonds or other gemstones in the ring look rich in color or bright white if diamonds?
If the Price of That Wedding Ring Seems Too Good to be True, it Probably is
You’ve all heard it before, but: “You get what you pay for.” There is a very good reason why one ring costs $1,000.00 more than a similar one.
In the ring above, notice that the nice thickness you see in the bottom third of the ring looks less substantial when the diamond settings have been cut into it in the upper section.
The ring you choose needs to be especially thick in the area where diamond settings are drilled into it.
The more expensive ring is probably heavier, it was cast using more gold, and more time was spent setting the gemstones.
A well made ring was made to last a longer time. The cheaper one? It was made for profit, not the happiness of the wearer.
You’ll Never Have a More Important Piece of Jewelry Than Your Wedding Ring
Take your time in selecting it. Consider having it custom made so you’ll know the thickness and quality will be built in. I know a good designer…..
Your Personal Jeweler,
Calla Gold
I love your jewelry blog. Your Calla Gold Jewelry site is a cool site and I wanted to post a little note to tell you, good job! Best wishes!!
Thanks for your kind words!
OMG this is such valuable information Calla! Thank you for sharing it. I have little side diamonds on my wedding ring and I will definitely have you check out their safety! You are truly an expert jeweler. Glad Santa Barbara has you!
Amber,
Thanks for letting me know you liked this. I’m glad you’ll be keeping an eye on those little side diamonds on your wedding ring!
Calla Gold
Inspector Calla to the rescue again! Been there, done that. Thanks for helping me and others protect jewelry investments and keepsakes.
Appreciatively,
Lynn
Dr. Lynn K. Jones, Certified Personal and Executive Coach
http://www.lynnkjones.com
Dr. Lynn,
I was just looking at that picture of me holding the loupe and it does look jewelry detective ish doesn’t it?
Glad you liked the advice!
Calla Gold
Lynn,
I am upgrading my plain 14K yellow gold wedding set with a sparkly white gold set. The style I like is shared prong with lots of small diamonds 3/4 around shank, all around the center stone and the setting. The ring is available in 18K white gold or platinum, which would be best considering all the small diamonds…platinum? Thank you!
Hi Chele, When shared prongs which beautifully show off diamonds, but are a maintenance issue long term are used, I prefer the hardness of 14kt white gold. When my clients ask me for this kind of design for a daily wear ring and want platinum I recommend an 85/15% mix rather than the usual 90/10 mix where 90% is pure platinum and 10% is hardening alloy metals. That extra 15% of hardening alloys cuts down on the malleability of the platinum. If you go with platinum, under no circumstances get talked into the 95/5% pure mix, it is just too… Read more »
Nice and informative article. All the points are practical and appreciatable.
Dear Oscar,
Thank you for your feedback.
Your Personal Jeweler,
Calla
A great informative article.
Hi Amelia,
Thank you for your feedback. It’s always helpful.
Your Personal Jeweler,
Calla