The trend is continuing :(
3rd February 2025 - Customer location: Cairns
A near new ring made by someone else with a host of issues :(
This is a near new ring purchased on an overseas holiday to replace a lost engagement ring. It has quite a few issues which are listed below:
The ring does not fit her
It does not fit her present wedding ring
A diamond is missing from the halo
The main gem is loose
The under-rail of the main gem is too low
The claw at the point of the gem is not suitable for the customers intended wear
The white colour sections are yellow gold rhodium plated to appear white gold
With absolutely no chance of having the above issues addressed by the seller of the ring in a far off land….it came to me.
Addressing Issue 6 : The claw at the point of the gem is not suitable for the customers intended wear
Lets address the issue of the setting style used at the point of the pear cut Emerald gem first. We can fix this by going from a round claw to a v-claw to secure that vulnerable point of the gem. This will also aid in stabilising the gem.
Emeralds are a very special gem and they scratch and break much more readily than say sapphire or ruby. A bump to that gem could result in damage due to the gem being suspended at that point.
A v-claw offers a pocket for the gem to sit in and then secures it by the two sides of the v shaped claw. This style of setting reduces the strain put on the weakest part of a pear cut gem, the point. Given the customers intended wear we needed to change to a v-claw.
Addressing issue 6: A diamond is missing from the halo
When you claw set very small .9mm diameter gems you use much smaller claws. Claws that are less than .2mm need to be looked after. The slightest bump can bend them and gems are lost. This ring has hardly been worn and the small diamond may have been missing when they purchased the ring. They were not aware of it until I pointed it out to them at our first meeting. We needed to come up with a sturdier setting style for the halo.
We decided to replace the small diamonds with slightly larger and also to increase the claw size. Two diamonds would be used in each feature instead of four and the customer also decided to narrow it as well. The 6 larger round diamonds would be re-used.
Addressing issues 2, 5 & 7 : Fitting the wedding ring, adding an under-rail and some real white gold
The customer thought that their ring was yellow gold with white gold claws. That was not the case. You can see the metal underneath where the diamond used to be is yellow gold. The ring was mass produced and cast in one piece using all yellow gold. The white appearance of the claw tops was from them being rhodium plated white.
We would remake the setting in 18ct palladium white gold and the band in 18ct yellow gold. The above photo shows you our next issue, her straight wedding ring cannot sit next to this ring.
The biggest changes to the ring would be to the down the finger view. The only way for her existing straight wedding ring to sit under the main gem was to raise the halo and to modify underneath. The client approved these changes.
Adding metal under the gem to stabilise it.
With the previous setting shown to the right you can see that there is no metal above the halo claws. That meant that the emerald was suspended at the edge of the gem (girdle) on the rounded end and at the point. With nothing under the gem to support it any pressure on the gem could result in it chipping at the claws.
The addition of an under-rail shown in the photo to the right would give both vertical and horizontal stability to the gem. If you love suspended gems then make sure your intended wear/lifestyle matches that style of setting.
Addressing Issue 1 : The ring does not fit her
The draft on the right was used to confirm the design and to be resized to discover the perfect size.
With the design pretty much confirmed it was time to make a silver draft for the customers approval and to also use it to determine the exact size this ring needed to be. I can use the draft to stretch, chop pieces out off and damage away as I determine the correct finger size for the ring.
Article: Why you should avoid resizing a new ring
You might be asking why the new ring was not made to the same size as the wedding ring? We already know that size don’t we? The answer is it is not that simple.
Two rings, same finger, different sizes. Why?
As a general rule the wider a ring is the larger it needs to be to fit the same finger. That is even more so the case when people suffer from arthritis as this customer does.
There are two main things that I find annoy women about how rings fit. The first is bulging skin either side of the ring and the other is when the ring spins. Too tight and too loose, how to find a balance? Well using the draft I can manipulate it to find the best result we can. In this case it was when the engagement ring is about 1.5 sizes smaller than the much wider wedding ring.
All done
The finished ring.
The customer was thrilled with the finished ring. You either love the natural flaws in Emeralds or you do not. I personally love the flawed nature of Emeralds but they are not a gem suitable for everyday wear in my opinion. I would have advised this customer against selecting an Emerald. She has been informed of the care required for an Emerald so we will see how it goes.
One final point, the invoice for the original ring purchased overseas did not state the origin of the Emerald. I am not a gemologist, but to me that colour is not Columbian Emerald and when I first saw the gem I was not even sure it was an Emerald.
After a bit of reading I am now guessing it has come from the new fields in Afghanistan. Why is the origin of the gemstone not on the invoice? I really wonder about the jewellery industry at times :(