Crafted by Infinity Review
Crafted by Infinity is actually a brand sold exclusively by several dealers rather than a brand owned and sold by a single online vendor. There are some immediate advantages to this. The first that is evident to me is that the quality of the product will likely be higher because of the additional vetting process by the nature of having more parties involved. Second is that the cutting house is more focused on what they specialise in and don’t have other internal pressures to save costs by retaining carat weight on their diamonds. Third is that the brand must have some kind of unique look about them that can be immediately recognisable.
As I was browsing the Crafted by Infinity website doing this review, I came across an important point. Cut grading is in its infancy and unlike color or clarity, what is graded excellent today may not be excellent in a few years time and this can have serious implications on the future value of the diamond you purchase. Of course, you don’t have to purchase an Infinity diamond to protect yourself. There are also many reasons that precision cutting and H&A may never become a recognised superior cut grade by the major labs.
Crafted by Infinity makes an effort to market their diamonds as ‘superideal’ and that their diamonds are cut to perfection. They claim that their diamonds are cut to such rare standards that it is more rare than D color and IF clarity. They make a point to say that they cut ‘only’ 1000 diamonds per year. They say that their brand’s best feature is “Flawless Cut”. I have no problems with most of these claims as they are mostly true. For example, I have heard that superideal cut diamonds are in the top 1% of all diamonds cut and D-E color diamonds make up around 2% of diamonds. What I do have a slight problem with is the idea of a flawless cut. Although there is also no standard for what a flawless cut is, we do know that most H&A diamonds have minor defects. Diamonds that have several minor defects or major defects will not be considered H&A by some vendors. So I can tell how strict a H&A vendor is by how many defects they accept as part of their brand. A H&A vendor that markets their diamonds as ‘Flawless’ to me is potentially misleading consumers and together with the whole marketing pitch makes me feel like I am expecting top-notch quality even amongst the H&A vendors. We will find out later in this review whether the Infinity diamonds hold up against such high expectations.
Crafted by Infinity does not sell diamonds on their own website. However, on their homepage you will find a link to their dealers around the world. As I look through the list, the two vendors I have heard of already are High Performance Diamonds by Wink Jones and Diamonds by Lauren by David Friedlander. Basically, each online vendor will carry the same list of Infinity diamonds for the same price, using the same search engine. The search engine is pretty basic and you can only choose between round and princess cuts, the 4C’s, and price. Lets see if there really isn’t any need to have advanced search functions.
First there are only about 100 diamonds in total, I managed to find 6 G to H VS2 diamonds to compare. The information on Infinity’s system is not presented very well, with the table, depth, pavilion, and crown information only visible if you click on a button labelled ‘expert details’. Even then, there isn’t any information about the lower girdles length or girdle thickness information and you have to find that information on the AGS lab report yourself. As far as I can tell, all of the Infinity diamonds are graded by AGS, which has both its positives and negatives, as you will know from previous tutorials. One positive is that Infinity provides AGS lab reports that also have the hearts view so that provides an independent verification of the hearts image.
I collected the data from the 6 diamonds and put in them in the table below:
Infinity Table
All of these diamonds have thin to medium girdles, which helps the 1.01 ct stone to reach that 6.5mm mark that is expected of an ideal 1ct diamond. Apart from this, the only things I can comment on is that the table size is generally between 55% and 57% and each one has a total depth under 62%. From the small sample above, it does not seem like there is a specific pavilion angle that these diamonds are cut to like the Brian Gavin Diamonds stones. This is a positive for those who are about squeezing the last bit of carat weight into the diameter of the diamond. The theme of spread continues as I look at the crown facets. All of them are between 34 – 34.5 degrees and this means two things – better spread and a brighter stone under the table.
Finally I have a look at the lower girdle facets and all but 2 of them have a 78% lower girdle length with the other two 75% and 77%. Although probably not representative of all of their diamonds, I can only conclude that there is not a single contrast pattern of the arrows on all Infinity diamonds and you still have that freedom to choose your preference. It also seems like the lower girdle facets are cut so that they are just under 80% in order to achieve a hearts pattern that does not have a clear clef in the middle of the hearts.
So far all of the numbers look good right? Well we know that these numbers only tell half the story so lets get into the hearts image and idealscope images to see how the Crafted by Infinity diamonds hold up to their reputation.
Light Performance
Here are the 6 idealscope images.
table of idealscopes
From a light performance point of view, all of the diamonds above seem to look good in their idealscopes with no visible leakage. The light return also seems very balanced throughout the diamond. Although it may seem like there is no leakage in the upper girdles and that there may be some crown-only painting, it is not the case here as I think this is more to do with photography.
actual1 Eightstar
You can see from the actual image of the 1.03 GVS2 on the left that there is some contrast in the upper girdles. On the right is what an idealscope of a Eightstar diamond that has crown-only painting looks like. So you can see that the idealscope images of the Infinity diamonds are clearly not the same.
Optical Symmetry
table of hearts
The first diamond in the table is the 1.03 GVS2. Apart from some yaw and distorted V’s, which I consider minor, there is a defect here that some H&A vendors could find cause as to reject this diamond as a true H&A. Take a look at the heart at the 12 o’clock position, this heart is slightly smaller than most of the rest. You can see that the gap between the heart and the V is bigger than all the rest apart from the opposing heart. The idealscope tells the story more clearly the larger hotspot in between the second and third arrow is a clear indicator of a smaller heart. In the case of this diamond, the opposing heart is also slightly smaller. This helps the diamond visually but it still misses the mark as a true H&A in my books.
Surprisingly, the rest of the diamonds have some serious problems with yaw. The V’s are also mostly distorted and there is some serious misalignment of hearts as well as V’s. Although not a cut issue, I also noticed an inclusion that reflects around the pavilion in the third diamond, what is known as a ‘reflector’. This is not good for a VS2 diamond and you can definitely find better. There are actually all sorts of H&A defects in these examples. In the fifth diamond, the hearts are touching the V’s indicating shorter lower girdles. I’m pretty sure that this is the diamond with the 75% lower girdle length as stated on the certificate. The problem is that this heart image indicates lower girdles that are tending to the short end of the average stated. If you are not a H&A purist and like thicker arrows producing bolder flashes, then this 1.05 HVS2 may actually be one of the better choices out of this sample as the defects do not affect the face up view. The defects to the lower girdles go both ways as although the stated longest lower girdles were 78%, it is clear that some of these hearts, in particular the third diamond, display a clef in the middle that could also cause a rejection for some H&A vendors.
Price
The 1.03 HVS2 in this review costs $10,687. A quick comparison with James Allen, which I have found to have both great prices and quality that at least match what I have seen at Crafted By Infinity, shows a 1.01 HVS2 True Heart to cost $8,310. This is a 26% premium on a price per carat basis. This is before an up to 5% pricescope discount on James Allen, you get the idea…
Value Added Services
As Crafted by Infinity is not a retailer themselves, each of their dealers will have their own value added services so I will not go over them here. There is one interesting value add that Crafted by Infinity provides and that is their ‘Meet the Cutter’ events. This gives a chance for any Infinity owners to go to any one of their dealers who is holding one of these events where they get to meet the person who cuts their diamond. I guess this may appeal to some of you out there.
Conclusion
I have to say that I am a bit shocked to see some of these H&A defects on Crafted by Infinity diamonds. This is because I previously held their diamonds in high regard due to their great reputation and the price premium they command. Crafted by Infinity produces beautiful diamonds and that’s for sure. But I have found them not to hold up to their claims that their diamonds are cut flawlessly, at least to my standards here, which are influenced by the general quality that I see amongst the online vendors that anyone in the world has easy access to. A positive for Infinity diamonds is that I have found that they are cut for spread and you will get a good sized diamond for the stated carat weight. This also means that their diamonds tend toward the brighter side of my recommended range of proportions rather than the dispersive side. Their excellent spread is due to their attention given to the thin to medium girdles, close to 56% table percentage, 40.7-degree pavilion angles, and close to 34-degree crown angles. All things considered, I actually wouldn’t recommend Crafted by Infinity to my readers as I do believe that there are better and cheaper alternatives out there.
Wednesday 24 July 2013
Sunday 14 July 2013
Good Old Gold Review
The Good Old Gold website feels very much like the bricks and mortar store that it is. The site aims to be very educational, and I personally learned a lot from the Good Old Gold website and from the youtube videos that Jonathan a.k.a. ‘Rhino’ produces. However, I must have been unsatisfied with how wealth of information is presented, and the fact that the site is stated as “The Ultimate Diamond Information Site”, when it really is a vendor’s website with the ultimate goal of selling diamonds. This is what happens when vendors also want to educate consumers and it is impossible to avoid the issue of bias, no matter how educational the site may be. This is precisely why I thought there was a need for Prosumer Diamonds.
Quality of the Good Old Gold Superior Hearts & Arrows Diamond
Good Old Gold explains in their education pages on optical symmetry that their Superior designation is in response to the lack of optical symmetry grading by the major labs. It is obvious that Good Old Gold believes that the major labs fail to grade cut effectively because they advocate that optical symmetry ought to be very important in regards to cut grading.
It is important to note that Good Gold Gold will apply their Superior designation to diamonds with longer lower girdle lengths (>80%). These diamonds will not be traditional H&A diamonds as featured by other super-ideal diamond vendors. These kinds of diamonds will have a ‘open-heart’ H&A image and will display a clef in between the hearts. Purists will say that these are not true H&A, but in terms of beauty, Good Old Gold is correct to say that in ideal cut diamonds, a longer lower girdle length will not negatively impact the diamond and simply is a different ‘flavour’ of diamond.
Good Old Gold also has a premium designation that they say are for diamonds that just miss the mark of being superior. They give several examples of the kind of defects that will make a diamond lose its superior designation:
• The arrow shafts are not aligned at the base such that the star pattern around the table reflection is distorted.
• One or more smaller hearts, which affect the hotspots at the base of the arrow shafts such that they are not uniform.
Good Old Gold makes two claims about the near-H&A. The first is that a person will not be able to tell the difference between a superior and a premium. Second is that often, the near-H&A carry the same price premium has perfect H&A.
I cannot agree entirely with either of these statements because the first statement is only true if a person casually examines the diamonds. What I think they mean is that to an average consumer and with the naked eye that the two cannot be distinguished, and I think then this statement would be true for most excellent graded diamonds. The second statement is quite simply false. If both seller and buyer know the value of the product, then there will definitely be a significant price difference that should be comparable to the difference between a VVS1 and IF clarity diamond.
Lets have a look at the Good Old Gold Superior H&A to see how they hold up to their description. When I use their diamond search engine, the first thing I notice is that Good Old Gold does not carry that many diamonds so I cannot just pick out six random diamonds that are very similar like I have done so in my past reviews. Nevertheless, I have randomly selected six superior diamonds ranging from D to H and VVS1 to SI2 in clarity for the review.
Good Old Gold Diamond Spreadsheet
When I look at the diamonds in the above table, I immediately see that in general the table sizes are in between 55% to 57%. I also note that the depth percentages are all less than 62%. I am disappointed that there is no immediate information regarding the girdle, but quickly checking the lab reports of some of these diamonds reveal that most of them have thin to medium girdle thickness.
The crown angles are mostly around 34.5 and 35 degrees and the pavilion angle combinations are mostly 40.8 degrees with two exceptions. I will have a look at those more closely in a bit. So far, it seems that most of these proportions fall within my recommended specifications. The only thing I will say is that the superior H&A line does not have any particular look to them and they seem to be all selected by Good Old Gold for their light performance and overall visual appearance. To confirm this let me have a closer look at the two diamonds with the steeper pavilion angles.
First the 1.15ct DVS1:
actual-1
At first glance, the actual image of the diamond seems to show the brightness of the diamond under the table as strong and balanced. It is expected that the top half of the diamond appears brighter than the bottom half. When I first saw this image, I thought it was very weird that the crown is relatively darker than the rest of the diamond. I think this may be a photography issue because I have since gone on to check every one of Good Old Gold’s Superior H&A’s actual images and it does seem that the relative darkness of some of the facets seem to be flipped.
I will illustrate what I mean by the following example of a 1.53ct KVS1 with lab#9977210.
actual-153kvs1Video of 153KVS1
The image of the left is the actual diamond picture on the Good Old Gold website, the image of the left is taken off of a recent video of the same diamond. Have a look at the bright crown in the video and a dark table reflection. This is opposite of the dark crown and the bright table reflection. Also notice the much more dark bottom half of the diamond in the video compared to the image on the website.
Lets get back to the DVS1. Below is the hearts image.
hearts-1
As you can see, the hearts all have a clef in between them indicating a >80% lower girdle length. Apart from this, I can only seem very minor misalignment of the hearts and the V’s are slightly distorted indicating that there is minor yaw in the diamond. This would not be a diamond that I would rate in the top 10% of super-ideal H&A diamonds. The good things going on are that all the hearts are the same size so I would expect the hotspots to be fairly uniform and also that the opposing V’s are actually quite symmetrical, an important link between optical symmetry and light performance. Also, the separation between the hearts and the V’s are uniform indicating tight variances in the lower girdles.
Good Old Gold does not provide an idealscope image, but instead uses their technology known as a diamxray. A diamxray works in the same way as an idealscope but is designed to work with a much stronger backlighting. Good Old Gold says that it is possible to be more critical with a diamxray than an idealscope image. I personally would prefer an idealscope because I am more used to analysing them.
diamxray-1
Looking at the hotspots, they are fairly uniform as expected at the base of the arrow shafts. As with all arrow views, slight tilt will affect photography so any comments as to optical symmetry should only be generalised. My biggest problem with diamxray is that it can be confusing for consumers. The reds in this image seem to be very uniform. But compare it with the diamxray image of below of another diamond.
diamxray-2
The difference in photography and in backlighting makes me question how to really analyse these images. Nevertheless, I do not see any leakage under the table in the DVS1 that many people fear with diamonds that have a pavilion angle at or above 41 degrees.
Now lets have a look at the other potentially problematic diamond, the 1.32ct HSI2. First the actual image:
actual-3
Just looking at this image, the arrows seem to not be reflecting as much head shadow/body obstruction as you normally expect. However, the diamond appears to be overall brighter than DVS1. From my reservations about the photography, I would be a bit cautious of this stone.
hearts-3
The hearts image looks fine with the only obvious defect at the nine o’clock heart where the two sides of the heart doesn’t line up.
diamxray-3
The diamxray of this diamond confuses me quite a bit. The image seems to confirm that the head shadow/body obstruction is weak in the arrows. But the whole image seems to display this darker color, from the upper girdles, to the lower girdles, and even in the table reflection. What is clear is that there does appear to be lighter pinks under the table than the previous images I have reviewed and this is directly related to a steeper pavilion angle. They are not yet to the point of leaking though, which can be seen by comparing to the white spots of leakage in the upper girdles that are expected.
Again, there is a possibility that the dark areas are an issue with photography. This fact does not sit well in the back of my mind. Perhaps I will run these questions by Rhino and see if he will shed some light and then I will come back and make whatever changes are necessary to this review. But what is certain is that I have looked at 3 diamxray images and all 3 are so different that it makes me feel like these images are not particularly helpful to consumers.
Quality of the Good Old Gold Premium Hearts & Arrows Diamond
Earlier in this review I have already mentioned two of the defects that can make a diamond miss the mark on a superior designation. I will repeat them here for convenience.
• The arrow shafts are not aligned at the base such that the star pattern around the table reflection is distorted.
• One or more smaller hearts, which affect the hotspots at the base of the arrow shafts such that they are not uniform.
For simplicity, I will randomly look at several arrows images of Good Old Gold’s Premium Ideal Cut Round.
arrows-gvs2 arrows-fvs2
Arrows-fsi1 smaller heart
There are an infinite number of variations that Good Old Gold seems to consider to be premium. From what I can tell, a main consideration is whether the diamond displays an arrows pattern. The four images above show various defects that you can find within the premium ideal cut designation. Most of the defects can be attributed to misalignment and twisting of the diamond due to yaw. The image on the bottom right shows what a diamond with one smaller heart would look like.
smaller heart image
You can see the smaller heart at the eight o’clock position. The heart is further away from the V because the lower girdle length at that point is longer than the others. The point is that if you want a premium cut diamond, there is a very wide range of diamonds and some will be closer to the Superior designation than others.
Price
First off, Good Old Gold does not offer a pricescope discount. Instead they just have a bank wire discount. There are some vendors out there that offer both pricescope and bank wire discounts. Many of the diamonds on Good Old Gold’s site do not have a price listed. The reason given by Rhino is that the stone may be on consignment or they may otherwise have an agreement with a supplier that does not want them to publicly list the price. A 1.02ct HVS2 Superior H&A that had a price was listed at $8,218. A comparable 1.02ct HVS2 True Heart from James Allen on the other hand is $7,510 (with further discounts available). The 10% extra that you are paying is for the many value added services that Good Old Gold provide starting with information, lots and lots of information.
Information Provided
When you purchase a Superior H&A diamond from Good Old Gold, you get an actual image, the diamxray, an ASET, hearts and arrows images, brilliantscope/gemex results, Isee2 results, and a photomicrograph showing the location of the inclusion.
Remember that information is only as good as the ability to interpret it. The brilliantscope counts the frequency of flashes with a stationary diamond and a moving light source. However, the brilliantscope does not take into account optical symmetry, contrast, or painting of the upper girdles. Therefore, there is a need for Isee2 technology, which assesses the contrast, brightness, and optical symmetry of the diamond and gives it a score out of 10. Apparently a perfect score is impossible to achieve. Neither of these technologies adequately measures the fire of a diamond.
On top of the brilliantscope and the Isee2, you also get a Helium report, which is the most comprehensive diamond report available. Just have a look yourself.
Helium
Also, because Good Old Gold is a brick and mortar store and Rhino is such a nice guy and really has passion in what he does, you are sure to get great customer service and have all this info explained to you when you go there in person.
Ease of Searching a Diamond
Good Old Gold has one of the best diamond search engines on the internet allowing you to literally search for any proportion combination. The only problem is that their limited inventory negates the usefulness of the search engine. Because they don’t have a lot of diamonds, it is easy to find the diamond they have or don’t have for your specifications. Overall, the site may seem confusing for first-time users because it is not designed like the typical Blue Nile type website. Another real plus for Good Old Gold is that they carry a very wide range of superior fancy cuts.
One thing I really like about the Good Old Gold diamond search filter is the ability to expand the details of all their diamonds in the list. It allows you to quickly see all the important information about the diamond immediately, which is very nice. Again, the fact that a lot of their diamonds do not have a listed price can be annoying for an online consumer.
Value Adding Company Policies
Good Old Gold has a 30-day return policy (less shipping), average for the industry. Where the Good Old Gold policies shine is that they have a lifetime trade-up policy where you can get a 100% credit (less shipping) toward another diamond that is equal or greater in value. They also have a buy-back policy where they will buy back your diamond at any time for 25% less than what you paid for it. This policy is one of the best I’ve seen in the industry. Finally, Good Old Gold can help your online buying experience by making a video for you. The only caveat, although understandable, is that there is a requirement for a $500 refundable deposit before they will make a video for you.
Conclusion
Congratulations for getting to the end of this extremely long review. I hope that I have covered most of the important points about Good Old Gold, their diamonds, and their value added services. The Good Old Gold Superior H&A diamonds are undoubtedly some of the most precision cut diamonds in the world. Every diamond in the Good Old Gold inventory is handpicked for their appearance, and each one will be uniquely suitable to a lucky consumer out there. Although Good Old Gold does not aim to be the cheapest vendor, their value add services are among the best in the industry.
I recommend purchasing a Superior H&A from Good Old Gold if you are looking for a super-ideal diamond with longer lower girdles for more pin fire flashes. I would also recommend them for those who are looking for the peace of mind of having as much information as is physically possible for a diamond.
The Premium ideal cut range encompasses a wide range of diamonds. As far as I can tell, these can be any diamond within the AGS0/GIAex cut grade that have aligned arrows with no major optical asymmetry. It is worthwhile to be more particular with Good Old Gold if you want to find a particularly nice Premium ideal cut diamond. If you are not going to be particular, there are cheaper alternatives out there for those on a tight budget working to maximise their bang for the buck and Good Old Gold may not be the place if you are looking to stretch your dollar. But if you value the experience of purchasing from a brick and mortar store, along with the quality of the customer service, then I can’t think of a better place than Good Old Gold.
Quality of the Good Old Gold Superior Hearts & Arrows Diamond
Good Old Gold explains in their education pages on optical symmetry that their Superior designation is in response to the lack of optical symmetry grading by the major labs. It is obvious that Good Old Gold believes that the major labs fail to grade cut effectively because they advocate that optical symmetry ought to be very important in regards to cut grading.
It is important to note that Good Gold Gold will apply their Superior designation to diamonds with longer lower girdle lengths (>80%). These diamonds will not be traditional H&A diamonds as featured by other super-ideal diamond vendors. These kinds of diamonds will have a ‘open-heart’ H&A image and will display a clef in between the hearts. Purists will say that these are not true H&A, but in terms of beauty, Good Old Gold is correct to say that in ideal cut diamonds, a longer lower girdle length will not negatively impact the diamond and simply is a different ‘flavour’ of diamond.
Good Old Gold also has a premium designation that they say are for diamonds that just miss the mark of being superior. They give several examples of the kind of defects that will make a diamond lose its superior designation:
• The arrow shafts are not aligned at the base such that the star pattern around the table reflection is distorted.
• One or more smaller hearts, which affect the hotspots at the base of the arrow shafts such that they are not uniform.
Good Old Gold makes two claims about the near-H&A. The first is that a person will not be able to tell the difference between a superior and a premium. Second is that often, the near-H&A carry the same price premium has perfect H&A.
I cannot agree entirely with either of these statements because the first statement is only true if a person casually examines the diamonds. What I think they mean is that to an average consumer and with the naked eye that the two cannot be distinguished, and I think then this statement would be true for most excellent graded diamonds. The second statement is quite simply false. If both seller and buyer know the value of the product, then there will definitely be a significant price difference that should be comparable to the difference between a VVS1 and IF clarity diamond.
Lets have a look at the Good Old Gold Superior H&A to see how they hold up to their description. When I use their diamond search engine, the first thing I notice is that Good Old Gold does not carry that many diamonds so I cannot just pick out six random diamonds that are very similar like I have done so in my past reviews. Nevertheless, I have randomly selected six superior diamonds ranging from D to H and VVS1 to SI2 in clarity for the review.
Good Old Gold Diamond Spreadsheet
When I look at the diamonds in the above table, I immediately see that in general the table sizes are in between 55% to 57%. I also note that the depth percentages are all less than 62%. I am disappointed that there is no immediate information regarding the girdle, but quickly checking the lab reports of some of these diamonds reveal that most of them have thin to medium girdle thickness.
The crown angles are mostly around 34.5 and 35 degrees and the pavilion angle combinations are mostly 40.8 degrees with two exceptions. I will have a look at those more closely in a bit. So far, it seems that most of these proportions fall within my recommended specifications. The only thing I will say is that the superior H&A line does not have any particular look to them and they seem to be all selected by Good Old Gold for their light performance and overall visual appearance. To confirm this let me have a closer look at the two diamonds with the steeper pavilion angles.
First the 1.15ct DVS1:
actual-1
At first glance, the actual image of the diamond seems to show the brightness of the diamond under the table as strong and balanced. It is expected that the top half of the diamond appears brighter than the bottom half. When I first saw this image, I thought it was very weird that the crown is relatively darker than the rest of the diamond. I think this may be a photography issue because I have since gone on to check every one of Good Old Gold’s Superior H&A’s actual images and it does seem that the relative darkness of some of the facets seem to be flipped.
I will illustrate what I mean by the following example of a 1.53ct KVS1 with lab#9977210.
actual-153kvs1Video of 153KVS1
The image of the left is the actual diamond picture on the Good Old Gold website, the image of the left is taken off of a recent video of the same diamond. Have a look at the bright crown in the video and a dark table reflection. This is opposite of the dark crown and the bright table reflection. Also notice the much more dark bottom half of the diamond in the video compared to the image on the website.
Lets get back to the DVS1. Below is the hearts image.
hearts-1
As you can see, the hearts all have a clef in between them indicating a >80% lower girdle length. Apart from this, I can only seem very minor misalignment of the hearts and the V’s are slightly distorted indicating that there is minor yaw in the diamond. This would not be a diamond that I would rate in the top 10% of super-ideal H&A diamonds. The good things going on are that all the hearts are the same size so I would expect the hotspots to be fairly uniform and also that the opposing V’s are actually quite symmetrical, an important link between optical symmetry and light performance. Also, the separation between the hearts and the V’s are uniform indicating tight variances in the lower girdles.
Good Old Gold does not provide an idealscope image, but instead uses their technology known as a diamxray. A diamxray works in the same way as an idealscope but is designed to work with a much stronger backlighting. Good Old Gold says that it is possible to be more critical with a diamxray than an idealscope image. I personally would prefer an idealscope because I am more used to analysing them.
diamxray-1
Looking at the hotspots, they are fairly uniform as expected at the base of the arrow shafts. As with all arrow views, slight tilt will affect photography so any comments as to optical symmetry should only be generalised. My biggest problem with diamxray is that it can be confusing for consumers. The reds in this image seem to be very uniform. But compare it with the diamxray image of below of another diamond.
diamxray-2
The difference in photography and in backlighting makes me question how to really analyse these images. Nevertheless, I do not see any leakage under the table in the DVS1 that many people fear with diamonds that have a pavilion angle at or above 41 degrees.
Now lets have a look at the other potentially problematic diamond, the 1.32ct HSI2. First the actual image:
actual-3
Just looking at this image, the arrows seem to not be reflecting as much head shadow/body obstruction as you normally expect. However, the diamond appears to be overall brighter than DVS1. From my reservations about the photography, I would be a bit cautious of this stone.
hearts-3
The hearts image looks fine with the only obvious defect at the nine o’clock heart where the two sides of the heart doesn’t line up.
diamxray-3
The diamxray of this diamond confuses me quite a bit. The image seems to confirm that the head shadow/body obstruction is weak in the arrows. But the whole image seems to display this darker color, from the upper girdles, to the lower girdles, and even in the table reflection. What is clear is that there does appear to be lighter pinks under the table than the previous images I have reviewed and this is directly related to a steeper pavilion angle. They are not yet to the point of leaking though, which can be seen by comparing to the white spots of leakage in the upper girdles that are expected.
Again, there is a possibility that the dark areas are an issue with photography. This fact does not sit well in the back of my mind. Perhaps I will run these questions by Rhino and see if he will shed some light and then I will come back and make whatever changes are necessary to this review. But what is certain is that I have looked at 3 diamxray images and all 3 are so different that it makes me feel like these images are not particularly helpful to consumers.
Quality of the Good Old Gold Premium Hearts & Arrows Diamond
Earlier in this review I have already mentioned two of the defects that can make a diamond miss the mark on a superior designation. I will repeat them here for convenience.
• The arrow shafts are not aligned at the base such that the star pattern around the table reflection is distorted.
• One or more smaller hearts, which affect the hotspots at the base of the arrow shafts such that they are not uniform.
For simplicity, I will randomly look at several arrows images of Good Old Gold’s Premium Ideal Cut Round.
arrows-gvs2 arrows-fvs2
Arrows-fsi1 smaller heart
There are an infinite number of variations that Good Old Gold seems to consider to be premium. From what I can tell, a main consideration is whether the diamond displays an arrows pattern. The four images above show various defects that you can find within the premium ideal cut designation. Most of the defects can be attributed to misalignment and twisting of the diamond due to yaw. The image on the bottom right shows what a diamond with one smaller heart would look like.
smaller heart image
You can see the smaller heart at the eight o’clock position. The heart is further away from the V because the lower girdle length at that point is longer than the others. The point is that if you want a premium cut diamond, there is a very wide range of diamonds and some will be closer to the Superior designation than others.
Price
First off, Good Old Gold does not offer a pricescope discount. Instead they just have a bank wire discount. There are some vendors out there that offer both pricescope and bank wire discounts. Many of the diamonds on Good Old Gold’s site do not have a price listed. The reason given by Rhino is that the stone may be on consignment or they may otherwise have an agreement with a supplier that does not want them to publicly list the price. A 1.02ct HVS2 Superior H&A that had a price was listed at $8,218. A comparable 1.02ct HVS2 True Heart from James Allen on the other hand is $7,510 (with further discounts available). The 10% extra that you are paying is for the many value added services that Good Old Gold provide starting with information, lots and lots of information.
Information Provided
When you purchase a Superior H&A diamond from Good Old Gold, you get an actual image, the diamxray, an ASET, hearts and arrows images, brilliantscope/gemex results, Isee2 results, and a photomicrograph showing the location of the inclusion.
Remember that information is only as good as the ability to interpret it. The brilliantscope counts the frequency of flashes with a stationary diamond and a moving light source. However, the brilliantscope does not take into account optical symmetry, contrast, or painting of the upper girdles. Therefore, there is a need for Isee2 technology, which assesses the contrast, brightness, and optical symmetry of the diamond and gives it a score out of 10. Apparently a perfect score is impossible to achieve. Neither of these technologies adequately measures the fire of a diamond.
On top of the brilliantscope and the Isee2, you also get a Helium report, which is the most comprehensive diamond report available. Just have a look yourself.
Helium
Also, because Good Old Gold is a brick and mortar store and Rhino is such a nice guy and really has passion in what he does, you are sure to get great customer service and have all this info explained to you when you go there in person.
Ease of Searching a Diamond
Good Old Gold has one of the best diamond search engines on the internet allowing you to literally search for any proportion combination. The only problem is that their limited inventory negates the usefulness of the search engine. Because they don’t have a lot of diamonds, it is easy to find the diamond they have or don’t have for your specifications. Overall, the site may seem confusing for first-time users because it is not designed like the typical Blue Nile type website. Another real plus for Good Old Gold is that they carry a very wide range of superior fancy cuts.
One thing I really like about the Good Old Gold diamond search filter is the ability to expand the details of all their diamonds in the list. It allows you to quickly see all the important information about the diamond immediately, which is very nice. Again, the fact that a lot of their diamonds do not have a listed price can be annoying for an online consumer.
Value Adding Company Policies
Good Old Gold has a 30-day return policy (less shipping), average for the industry. Where the Good Old Gold policies shine is that they have a lifetime trade-up policy where you can get a 100% credit (less shipping) toward another diamond that is equal or greater in value. They also have a buy-back policy where they will buy back your diamond at any time for 25% less than what you paid for it. This policy is one of the best I’ve seen in the industry. Finally, Good Old Gold can help your online buying experience by making a video for you. The only caveat, although understandable, is that there is a requirement for a $500 refundable deposit before they will make a video for you.
Conclusion
Congratulations for getting to the end of this extremely long review. I hope that I have covered most of the important points about Good Old Gold, their diamonds, and their value added services. The Good Old Gold Superior H&A diamonds are undoubtedly some of the most precision cut diamonds in the world. Every diamond in the Good Old Gold inventory is handpicked for their appearance, and each one will be uniquely suitable to a lucky consumer out there. Although Good Old Gold does not aim to be the cheapest vendor, their value add services are among the best in the industry.
I recommend purchasing a Superior H&A from Good Old Gold if you are looking for a super-ideal diamond with longer lower girdles for more pin fire flashes. I would also recommend them for those who are looking for the peace of mind of having as much information as is physically possible for a diamond.
The Premium ideal cut range encompasses a wide range of diamonds. As far as I can tell, these can be any diamond within the AGS0/GIAex cut grade that have aligned arrows with no major optical asymmetry. It is worthwhile to be more particular with Good Old Gold if you want to find a particularly nice Premium ideal cut diamond. If you are not going to be particular, there are cheaper alternatives out there for those on a tight budget working to maximise their bang for the buck and Good Old Gold may not be the place if you are looking to stretch your dollar. But if you value the experience of purchasing from a brick and mortar store, along with the quality of the customer service, then I can’t think of a better place than Good Old Gold.
Saturday 13 July 2013
Whiteflash Review
Quality of the Whiteflash “A Cut Above” (ACA)
The ACA diamond is Whiteflash’s signature top of the line super-ideal H&A diamond. It was developed as a response to the Eight Star diamond’s marketing strategy that made them seem like they claimed that there was no other cut possible that could achieve 100% light return.
On their website, Whiteflash markets the ACA as:
ACA MarketingACA Specifications
The picture on the left shows why consumers might really want the ACA. Whiteflash is targeting those who want to seek the best of the best in terms of both cut quality and light performance.
Out of the 8 specifications of the ACA stated in the right picture, the only ones relevant to achieving this goal is an AGS000 diamond with a platinum light performance report. Although there are subtle differences that a prosumer should be aware of before deciding on a diamond with an AGS v GIA diamond certificate, this topic is outside the scope of this review. Whiteflash also promises light performance imaging with each ACA and negligible fluorescence.
Please note that the cut of the ACA is not special, it is a modern 57 facet round brilliant cut diamond, it is the cut quality, that is meant to be special. Unlike Blue Nile who publishes a range of proportions that fit into their signature line, Whiteflash does not explicitly mention their range of proportions. However, the ACA is actually cut to more exacting standards than Blue Nile’s signature.
Comparison Table
I took 6 random GVS2’s from the ACA line to check their proportions. What is immediately clear is that all of them have thin to medium girdles. The next thing I notice is that the table % is between 55-57%, the depth % is between 61.5-62%.
An interesting thing that I have noticed with most ACA’s is that the crown angles are cut over 34.5 degrees, and actually closer to 35 degrees. Also, most ACA’s have a pavilion angle between 40.7 and 40.9 degrees. This actually causes a slight decrease in light return under the table when compared to a 34.5/40.8 CA/PA relationship. For more information on light performance please read my next tutorial.
For now, it is sufficient for my readers to understand that a decrease in light performance is not always a bad thing and it boils down to whether you prefer a brighter diamond that appears more uniformly ‘glassy’, or a slightly less bright diamond that has more contrast which can be seen by a more distinctive arrows patterning. It seems to me that Whiteflash has chosen the latter as more representative of the ACA brand. Please note that the words I have chosen to use is a “decrease in light return” and not “light leakage”.
A decrease in light return under the table will in theory have a negative impact on its fire. However, it is my opinion that the ACA’s minor decrease in light return will not have a negative impact on the diamond’s fire. In smaller diamonds, this is because the facets are so small that the areas in question will be seen as an ‘on-off’ event. In larger diamonds, the advanced diamond optics of virtual facets become the most significant factor determining a diamond’s fire. Without going into depth on either of these concepts since they are prosumer level 3 topics, it is sufficient to conclude that the ACA is cut to enhance the contrast of the patterning of the arrows whilst maintaining excellent light performance in the rest of the diamond. The ACA is therefore cut slightly steep and slightly deep by design, without going over the important thresholds of light performance. As a result, it also benefits the company as this design will retain a higher weight than an Eight Star by having a higher yield of the rough diamond.
ACA actualExpert Selection actual
Without telling you which is which, can you tell the difference? Which is better looking to you? The pictures above demonstrate my point about the ACA. The diamond on the left is an ACA with a CA/PA of 34.9/40.9 and the one on the right is a diamond from Whiteflash’s Expert Selection range with a CA/PA of 34.5/40.8. Neither diamond can be said to be more beautiful than the other. An objective statement would be that the ACA has better optical symmetry. Another objective statement is that the Expert Selection on the right has more light return. Whether more light return = better light performance is a subjective question.
If we just focus on optical symmetry, the ACA’s are in general excellent. Whiteflash strives to set the industry standard on what a true H&A diamond should be. You can see that the lower girdle % of 6 sampled diamonds are between 76-77%, well below the length where you will begin to see a clef between the hearts. Please note that this is by design only and a super-ideal diamond that has the highest precision cutting can have lower girdle % of 80-85 without negative impact on light performance. This changes on the character of the diamond, which is the topic of a later tutorial.
When choosing an ACA, you will note that there are not many choices depending on your other 4C’s criteria. However, if you are looking for the best of the best, it is still prudent to try to search for an ACA with no discernable yaw. If you are one of these prosumers, then I urge you to contact me about this topic as it may take me a while before I reach that topic in my tutorials.
Quality of Whiteflash’s Expert Selection
Whiteflash claims that their Expert Selection diamonds are those that narrowly missed the cut to become an ACA. Whether Expert Selection stones were those destined to be ACA’s but failed is a mystery. What I can tell you that there are two ways that diamonds can miss the mark. First is the optical symmetry, second is the light performance.
Don’t try to find an Expert Selection stone that has both perfect optical symmetry and light performance, you won’t find one. I would recommend looking for one with excellent light performance with no obvious defects in its optical symmetry. These are what I consider to be near H&A. Purchasing from the Expert Selection range may save you some money but be more careful when choosing one because unlike the ACA, there is no typical look to them. I have come across both stones with no light leakage as well as stones that have very obvious light leakage.
Whiteflash also has a Premium Select line that is basically a non-signature line that they have in-house. I will not be reviewing the Premium Select line.
Price
The first thing to note is that Whiteflash offers a 5% Pricescope discount. They also a one-time offer $50 for registering with them on your first purchase. The prices at Whiteflash are a bit confusing to me because there is really not much difference between the Expert Selection and the ACA. Just for comparison, I randomly found a 1.047 HVS1 Expert Selection for US$8,678 and a 1.020 HVS1 ACA for US$8,548. Neither stone had fluorescence. In comparison, a 1.05 HVS1 Blue Nile Signature Ideal diamond with no fluorescence was listed at US$8,611. Its clear to me that Whiteflash offers great value for the quality, selection, and information that is provided.
Information Provided
ACA diamonds comes with an AGS000 platinum light performance report, an actual picture of the diamond under magnification, idealscope, ASET, hearts image under a Hearts and Arrows viewer, and also a simplified Sarin report. The simple Sarin report does not add much value, since a comprehensive Sarin report will show the variances in all the measured proportions. Whiteflash will also tell you whether the diamond is eye-clean. Remember, eye-cleanliness is a subjective matter. However, Whiteflash’s definition of eye-clean is:
“No inclusions visible to the naked eye of a person with 20/20 vision when viewing the diamond in the face-up position at a distance of approximately 10 inches under normal overhead lighting.”
Unlike an ACA, the Expert Selection diamonds will not have a hearts image. Therefore, any signs of yaw will have to be discerned from the idealscope image. Please not that unless an idealscope image is taken under a highly reproducible environment, there are too many factors that make discerning optical symmetry from the idealscope image impossible.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
Perhaps the biggest problem I have with Whiteflash is the actual experience of looking for a diamond from them. Although the website provides a lot of information including the option of seeing thumbnails of the actual pictures of the diamond on the search screen, the site is much slower than Blue Nile, which can get annoying on your diamond search. Whiteflash must be commended for their photography. The benefit of having high quality actual pictures outweighs all the disadvantages because it allows a trained eye to quickly find those diamonds that fit your specifications without even clicking into the diamond. Because of this, after apply our filters; I can go through the entire inventory on Whiteflash in very little time.
One thing they must fix is their user interface. They have a searching function available in a sidebar, which is very confusing. Also, there seems to be a bug where I have to check an ACA in order to filter it out, which is counterintuitive.
Value Adding Company Policies
Whiteflash has a 30-day return policy on all in-house loose diamonds. They have an excellent lifetime trade-up policy where you can have 100% credit for full purchase price upon spending an equal or greater value.
Conclusion
Whiteflash offers great value for the quality, selection, information provided. On top of that, they have an excellent trade up policy. Unless you have access to similar quality stones at a better price, I highly recommend purchasing from Whiteflash whether you are looking for the best of the best, or the best way to spend your money.
The ACA diamond is Whiteflash’s signature top of the line super-ideal H&A diamond. It was developed as a response to the Eight Star diamond’s marketing strategy that made them seem like they claimed that there was no other cut possible that could achieve 100% light return.
On their website, Whiteflash markets the ACA as:
ACA MarketingACA Specifications
The picture on the left shows why consumers might really want the ACA. Whiteflash is targeting those who want to seek the best of the best in terms of both cut quality and light performance.
Out of the 8 specifications of the ACA stated in the right picture, the only ones relevant to achieving this goal is an AGS000 diamond with a platinum light performance report. Although there are subtle differences that a prosumer should be aware of before deciding on a diamond with an AGS v GIA diamond certificate, this topic is outside the scope of this review. Whiteflash also promises light performance imaging with each ACA and negligible fluorescence.
Please note that the cut of the ACA is not special, it is a modern 57 facet round brilliant cut diamond, it is the cut quality, that is meant to be special. Unlike Blue Nile who publishes a range of proportions that fit into their signature line, Whiteflash does not explicitly mention their range of proportions. However, the ACA is actually cut to more exacting standards than Blue Nile’s signature.
Comparison Table
I took 6 random GVS2’s from the ACA line to check their proportions. What is immediately clear is that all of them have thin to medium girdles. The next thing I notice is that the table % is between 55-57%, the depth % is between 61.5-62%.
An interesting thing that I have noticed with most ACA’s is that the crown angles are cut over 34.5 degrees, and actually closer to 35 degrees. Also, most ACA’s have a pavilion angle between 40.7 and 40.9 degrees. This actually causes a slight decrease in light return under the table when compared to a 34.5/40.8 CA/PA relationship. For more information on light performance please read my next tutorial.
For now, it is sufficient for my readers to understand that a decrease in light performance is not always a bad thing and it boils down to whether you prefer a brighter diamond that appears more uniformly ‘glassy’, or a slightly less bright diamond that has more contrast which can be seen by a more distinctive arrows patterning. It seems to me that Whiteflash has chosen the latter as more representative of the ACA brand. Please note that the words I have chosen to use is a “decrease in light return” and not “light leakage”.
A decrease in light return under the table will in theory have a negative impact on its fire. However, it is my opinion that the ACA’s minor decrease in light return will not have a negative impact on the diamond’s fire. In smaller diamonds, this is because the facets are so small that the areas in question will be seen as an ‘on-off’ event. In larger diamonds, the advanced diamond optics of virtual facets become the most significant factor determining a diamond’s fire. Without going into depth on either of these concepts since they are prosumer level 3 topics, it is sufficient to conclude that the ACA is cut to enhance the contrast of the patterning of the arrows whilst maintaining excellent light performance in the rest of the diamond. The ACA is therefore cut slightly steep and slightly deep by design, without going over the important thresholds of light performance. As a result, it also benefits the company as this design will retain a higher weight than an Eight Star by having a higher yield of the rough diamond.
ACA actualExpert Selection actual
Without telling you which is which, can you tell the difference? Which is better looking to you? The pictures above demonstrate my point about the ACA. The diamond on the left is an ACA with a CA/PA of 34.9/40.9 and the one on the right is a diamond from Whiteflash’s Expert Selection range with a CA/PA of 34.5/40.8. Neither diamond can be said to be more beautiful than the other. An objective statement would be that the ACA has better optical symmetry. Another objective statement is that the Expert Selection on the right has more light return. Whether more light return = better light performance is a subjective question.
If we just focus on optical symmetry, the ACA’s are in general excellent. Whiteflash strives to set the industry standard on what a true H&A diamond should be. You can see that the lower girdle % of 6 sampled diamonds are between 76-77%, well below the length where you will begin to see a clef between the hearts. Please note that this is by design only and a super-ideal diamond that has the highest precision cutting can have lower girdle % of 80-85 without negative impact on light performance. This changes on the character of the diamond, which is the topic of a later tutorial.
When choosing an ACA, you will note that there are not many choices depending on your other 4C’s criteria. However, if you are looking for the best of the best, it is still prudent to try to search for an ACA with no discernable yaw. If you are one of these prosumers, then I urge you to contact me about this topic as it may take me a while before I reach that topic in my tutorials.
Quality of Whiteflash’s Expert Selection
Whiteflash claims that their Expert Selection diamonds are those that narrowly missed the cut to become an ACA. Whether Expert Selection stones were those destined to be ACA’s but failed is a mystery. What I can tell you that there are two ways that diamonds can miss the mark. First is the optical symmetry, second is the light performance.
Don’t try to find an Expert Selection stone that has both perfect optical symmetry and light performance, you won’t find one. I would recommend looking for one with excellent light performance with no obvious defects in its optical symmetry. These are what I consider to be near H&A. Purchasing from the Expert Selection range may save you some money but be more careful when choosing one because unlike the ACA, there is no typical look to them. I have come across both stones with no light leakage as well as stones that have very obvious light leakage.
Whiteflash also has a Premium Select line that is basically a non-signature line that they have in-house. I will not be reviewing the Premium Select line.
Price
The first thing to note is that Whiteflash offers a 5% Pricescope discount. They also a one-time offer $50 for registering with them on your first purchase. The prices at Whiteflash are a bit confusing to me because there is really not much difference between the Expert Selection and the ACA. Just for comparison, I randomly found a 1.047 HVS1 Expert Selection for US$8,678 and a 1.020 HVS1 ACA for US$8,548. Neither stone had fluorescence. In comparison, a 1.05 HVS1 Blue Nile Signature Ideal diamond with no fluorescence was listed at US$8,611. Its clear to me that Whiteflash offers great value for the quality, selection, and information that is provided.
Information Provided
ACA diamonds comes with an AGS000 platinum light performance report, an actual picture of the diamond under magnification, idealscope, ASET, hearts image under a Hearts and Arrows viewer, and also a simplified Sarin report. The simple Sarin report does not add much value, since a comprehensive Sarin report will show the variances in all the measured proportions. Whiteflash will also tell you whether the diamond is eye-clean. Remember, eye-cleanliness is a subjective matter. However, Whiteflash’s definition of eye-clean is:
“No inclusions visible to the naked eye of a person with 20/20 vision when viewing the diamond in the face-up position at a distance of approximately 10 inches under normal overhead lighting.”
Unlike an ACA, the Expert Selection diamonds will not have a hearts image. Therefore, any signs of yaw will have to be discerned from the idealscope image. Please not that unless an idealscope image is taken under a highly reproducible environment, there are too many factors that make discerning optical symmetry from the idealscope image impossible.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
Perhaps the biggest problem I have with Whiteflash is the actual experience of looking for a diamond from them. Although the website provides a lot of information including the option of seeing thumbnails of the actual pictures of the diamond on the search screen, the site is much slower than Blue Nile, which can get annoying on your diamond search. Whiteflash must be commended for their photography. The benefit of having high quality actual pictures outweighs all the disadvantages because it allows a trained eye to quickly find those diamonds that fit your specifications without even clicking into the diamond. Because of this, after apply our filters; I can go through the entire inventory on Whiteflash in very little time.
One thing they must fix is their user interface. They have a searching function available in a sidebar, which is very confusing. Also, there seems to be a bug where I have to check an ACA in order to filter it out, which is counterintuitive.
Value Adding Company Policies
Whiteflash has a 30-day return policy on all in-house loose diamonds. They have an excellent lifetime trade-up policy where you can have 100% credit for full purchase price upon spending an equal or greater value.
Conclusion
Whiteflash offers great value for the quality, selection, information provided. On top of that, they have an excellent trade up policy. Unless you have access to similar quality stones at a better price, I highly recommend purchasing from Whiteflash whether you are looking for the best of the best, or the best way to spend your money.
Pricescope Rockytalky Reviews
Pricescope used to be a great forum for diamond education and I learned most of what I know from prosumers that have shared their knowledge there. Prosumers need to be aware however that the forum is very limited because of the forum rules, which prevent trade members from commenting on other vendor’s products. That leaves most of the advice given by other prosumers on that forum. But it is very difficult for a new consumer to tell what the good advice is from the bad. This isn’t because of a lack of knowledge on the part of the posters, but I have found that many consumers don’t know how to ask the right questions and therefore don’t get great advice. The forum is also limited because members can’t private message other members.
Much of the advice on Pricescope Rockytalky seems to be that if you purchase from BGD, Whiteflash, Good Old Gold, or many other Pricescope Vendors that the any diamond will be great! But the purpose of my site is to take as many consumers as I can to the next level so they can make better purchasing decisions. My readers should also be aware that Gary Holloway, the developer of the idealscope and the HCA, is a part owner of the site and that Pricescope doesn’t allow promotion of other sites such as mine but will allow promotions by Gary Holloway and other Pricescope Vendors.
In these Pricescope Rockytalky Reviews, I will find some of the more interesting questions and answer them here so that all my readers can learn from them. The other type of review I will do is when I find that a Pricescope Rockytalky answer is misleading or missing some crucial advice. Either way, by doing this, I hope these reviews will allow consumers to form better questions and receive better answers.
Much of the advice on Pricescope Rockytalky seems to be that if you purchase from BGD, Whiteflash, Good Old Gold, or many other Pricescope Vendors that the any diamond will be great! But the purpose of my site is to take as many consumers as I can to the next level so they can make better purchasing decisions. My readers should also be aware that Gary Holloway, the developer of the idealscope and the HCA, is a part owner of the site and that Pricescope doesn’t allow promotion of other sites such as mine but will allow promotions by Gary Holloway and other Pricescope Vendors.
In these Pricescope Rockytalky Reviews, I will find some of the more interesting questions and answer them here so that all my readers can learn from them. The other type of review I will do is when I find that a Pricescope Rockytalky answer is misleading or missing some crucial advice. Either way, by doing this, I hope these reviews will allow consumers to form better questions and receive better answers.
James Allen Review
Quality of the James Allen True Hearts Diamond
True Hearts Logo
The first thing I noticed immediately was that the marketing of the James Allen True Hearts diamond is subtler than other online vendors. This at first glance may seem to be an oversight on their part but the fact that in their diamond search function, their signature True Hearts range is simply stated in a button labelled “True”, as opposed to the other more familiar cut grades of Ideal, Very Good, and Good. It seems to me fairly easy for an average consumer to perceive this as a representation that the True Hearts Diamond is a true H&A diamond. While it is perfectly fine for James Allen to say this, consumers should be reminded that there is no official standard for what H&A is and I will be looking into whether the True Hearts still hold up to the Prosumer Diamonds standard of H&A.
So lets have a look at what James Allen says about their True Hearts Diamond. When I mouse over the “True” button, a description of what True Hearts is given. James Allen states that the True Hearts:
“Exhibit the near flawless Hearts and Arrows pattern of perfect optical symmetry that maximizes the diamond’s fire, brilliance, and light dispersion.” (Emphasis Added)
The ‘flawless’ H&A and ‘perfect’ optical symmetry and ‘maximising’ of light performance is qualified by the word ‘near’. This is an important point because it distinguishes those vendors who market their diamonds as having perfect H&A with James Allen who is marketing their True Hearts diamonds, which are actually near-perfect H&A. The part of this statement that I have a problem with is that although a diamond’s fire, brilliance, and light dispersion is affected by optical symmetry, it is arguably the proportions of the diamond that affects the diamond’s light performance primarily.
The full marketing material on the True Hearts diamond is hidden in the education section of James Allen’s website. James Allen stresses the fact that they provide actual pictures of the diamond’s H&A pattern and that you can see for yourself the perfect optical symmetry.
They go on to say that every True Hearts diamond is an ideal cut diamond. What this means is simply that the diamonds are graded excellent in cut by the GIA or AGS0 in cut grade. There is no information given on whether the True Hearts are hand selected for a narrower range of proportions than simply the full range of GIA excellent. The only further bit of marketing puff suggests to you that the True Hearts are “the most perfect of diamonds”. Now lets go on to test these claims!
Table 1
Table 2
As usual, I selected six 1ct GVS2 diamonds for comparison. I could not find a particular pattern to these diamonds that I find convincingly representative of the True Hearts line. It seems to me that there are no specific criteria for narrowing the parameters for the proportions and therefore no branded look to the True Hearts diamond; each True Hearts is unique. The only thing that I could say about the True Hearts in terms of proportions is that they are consistently cut with a thicker girdle and therefore the spread of the diamond is reduced and you can see that 1.028 ct diamond falls short of a 6.5mm diameter.
However, James Allen provides what appears to be an idealscope image of the arrows view, although I have not found marketing material referring to the idealscope. However, on inspection of the html and flash elements of their website, it does seem that they label this image as an idealscope image. I selected the two diamonds that I was most concerned with from the above selection to have a closer look at their idealscope images.
Idealscope 1.04Idealscope 1.028
The image on the left is the 1.04 ct with a 34.0/40.6 CA/PA and the right image is of the 1.028 AGS diamond with a 35.3/40.8 CA/PA. If you read my tutorial on diamond grading certificates, you will know that the AGS stone would have been a 35.5 degree CA on a GIA lab report. I have to say that I am impressed because even these two diamonds that are on the edge of what I am comfortable with appear to have decent light performance with no visible leakage. The diamond on the left, which by the lab report would seem at risk to a shallow/shallow combination, has excellent light return and no visible leakage under the table. The diamond on the right also does not have leakage under the table but is right on the edge having partial light return.
1.04 actual image
1.02 actual image
You can see from these images that each diamond has a different contrast pattern under the table facet and whichever diamond you prefer is a matter of your personal preference. All I can say is that both of these are beautiful diamonds.
Finally lets have a look at the hearts images of both diamonds.
Hearts 1.02Hearts 1.04
Unless you are going to scrutinise these diamonds to the nth degree, I can see there are only minor flaws from slight yawing that should put off only the most particular of diamond prosumers. Both these diamonds are likely to be considered as H&A across the industry and they indeed are H&A diamonds to me.
Price
James Allen does not mention a Pricescope discount on their site but there have been reports that they do offer a discount when asked so make sure you do that. They also don’t list a bank wire price so its not a bad idea to ask them for one either as most vendors have a further discount on a bank wire. Now lets compare James Allen’s True Hearts prices to some of the other branded H&A that I have already reviewed.
A random 1.04 GVS2 True Heart was listed as $8,450. A quick check on Blue Nile shows that a 1.04 GVS2 Signature Ideal costs $8,922. On Whiteflash, a 1.015 GVS2 ACA costs $9,074. It appears that James Allen is cheaper than both Whiteflash and Blue Nile on comparable stones and seems to offer great value indeed even without any discount applied. When comparing similar carat stones on price, make sure you have a look at the difference in diameter, I have a suspicion that James Allen stones will be slighly smaller than some other makes for the same carat due to a thicker girdle.
Information Provided
James Allen True Hearts diamonds come in both GIA and AGS certified stones. This can add a certain element of confusion for their consumers, as it is one more thing to decide between. To discover your preference, you need to stay tuned for my next tutorial on the differences between the cut grading at GIA and AGS as well as other commonly believed differences between the labs. For this review, I won’t suggest that either is better than the other. Suffice to note that AGS diamonds come with a platinum light performance report that includes an ASET, which is nice for those that want a bit more light performance information on their diamond.
As seen in this review, James Allen provides an idealscope image and hearts image on their True Hearts line. If you don’t know where to find these images, look for this button and mouse over the hearts and arrows images.
True Hearts icon
From viewing many of these images, there are no issues that I have with their photography setup.
On top of all this, James Allen also provides a 40x magnified actual photograph of the diamond. This image can be useful for looking for any dark and obvious inclusions if you are looking at SI quality stones. However, just remember that many inclusions by their very nature require you to focus past the surface of the diamond in order to see them. In VS quality stones, I would not place too much weight into these pictures except for identifying any characteristic inclusions that are near the surface of the diamond.
James Allen also provides a video of the diamond as it rotates through 360 degrees. This is meant to allow you to determine whether the diamond is eye-clean. James Allen’s definition of eye-cleanliness is “clean to an unaided eye in a face-up position from a distance of 8 to 10 inches”. They also say that if you have questions regarding the eye-cleanliness, you can contact their gemmologists to assist you. I think this is important especially if you are looking for SI quality stones. Ask their gemmologist to show you where the worst inclusions can be seen on the diamond. Under the kind of magnification James Allen provides, I would be surprised if a professional gemmologist is unable to identify any over a 360 degree rotation of the diamond.
Finally, on their non-branded stones, James Allen also allows you to choose up to 3 diamonds to get idealscope images.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
James Allen’s Website is among one of the best that I have used. It provides a very useful filter that allows you to type in values or drag the bar if you wished. There are different view options that allow you to view thumbnails of the diamonds or in list view. Impressively, the website is just as fast and snappy in either view. In list view, you can quickly see the table, depth, and fluorescence information but you cannot see the measurements unless you actually click into the diamond. However, James Allen does provide all of this information including the crown and pavilion angles and girdle thickness without needing to access the lab report. Accessing the lab report is also very quick and easy and you will need to do this if you want to find out the lower girdle length.
The only issues I have with their site is that the background they use in their pictures make it very difficult to determine light leakage just from looking at the actual image. In my opinion, a light-grey background will make it more difficult to see leakage because the color of the background is similar to the color of the light being returned. One other thing I have noticed but cannot be certain about is that diamonds that are DEF seem a lot whiter than those that are GHI, probably due to lighting rather than actual color of the diamond. It would not surprise me if this were to enhance the look of the more expensive diamonds. Please just remember that information is only as good as the ability to properly interpret it.
Value Adding Information
James Allen provides a lifetime warranty that covers leaning, polishing, prong tightening and rhodium plating if you pay for the shipping of your ring to them and back. This warranty also covers the loss of side stones in your ring if the loss was not caused by damage. James Allen stresses the point that this warranty is not an insurance and you will still need insurance to protect against damage, theft or loss.
James Allen provides free FedEx worldwide shipping and has a 60-day return policy and they even pay for the return shipping for US customers, which is nice. This return policy is excellent and is above average for the industry.
James Allen also provides an upgrade policy, which is the same as Blue Nile. That is a 100% credit for spending double the price of your first time. This I would rate as below average for the industry. They will also provide you with a free quote you’re your other diamonds that are GIA/AGS/IGI certified diamonds over a half carat if you are looking to trade-in.
Conclusion
I have been thoroughly impressed with James Allen and I think that it provides a good compromise between Blue Nile’s business model and those of Whiteflash and Brian Gavin Diamonds. The True Hearts definitely live up to what they are marketed as, and I would even say that in my opinion that they are marketed conservatively. The only caveat is that not all True Hearts are made equally and you really have to look for those that suit your preference. This fact however may actually appeal to prosumers. For the information they provide and their pricing, James Allen is an excellent place for prosumers who want to use a little bit of effort to find their top performing diamonds at a great price. Finally, James Allen may be a great place to find your forever ring, but if you are looking for diamonds that you may want to upgrade regularly, there are other vendors that provide much better upgrade policies.
True Hearts Logo
The first thing I noticed immediately was that the marketing of the James Allen True Hearts diamond is subtler than other online vendors. This at first glance may seem to be an oversight on their part but the fact that in their diamond search function, their signature True Hearts range is simply stated in a button labelled “True”, as opposed to the other more familiar cut grades of Ideal, Very Good, and Good. It seems to me fairly easy for an average consumer to perceive this as a representation that the True Hearts Diamond is a true H&A diamond. While it is perfectly fine for James Allen to say this, consumers should be reminded that there is no official standard for what H&A is and I will be looking into whether the True Hearts still hold up to the Prosumer Diamonds standard of H&A.
So lets have a look at what James Allen says about their True Hearts Diamond. When I mouse over the “True” button, a description of what True Hearts is given. James Allen states that the True Hearts:
“Exhibit the near flawless Hearts and Arrows pattern of perfect optical symmetry that maximizes the diamond’s fire, brilliance, and light dispersion.” (Emphasis Added)
The ‘flawless’ H&A and ‘perfect’ optical symmetry and ‘maximising’ of light performance is qualified by the word ‘near’. This is an important point because it distinguishes those vendors who market their diamonds as having perfect H&A with James Allen who is marketing their True Hearts diamonds, which are actually near-perfect H&A. The part of this statement that I have a problem with is that although a diamond’s fire, brilliance, and light dispersion is affected by optical symmetry, it is arguably the proportions of the diamond that affects the diamond’s light performance primarily.
The full marketing material on the True Hearts diamond is hidden in the education section of James Allen’s website. James Allen stresses the fact that they provide actual pictures of the diamond’s H&A pattern and that you can see for yourself the perfect optical symmetry.
They go on to say that every True Hearts diamond is an ideal cut diamond. What this means is simply that the diamonds are graded excellent in cut by the GIA or AGS0 in cut grade. There is no information given on whether the True Hearts are hand selected for a narrower range of proportions than simply the full range of GIA excellent. The only further bit of marketing puff suggests to you that the True Hearts are “the most perfect of diamonds”. Now lets go on to test these claims!
Table 1
Table 2
As usual, I selected six 1ct GVS2 diamonds for comparison. I could not find a particular pattern to these diamonds that I find convincingly representative of the True Hearts line. It seems to me that there are no specific criteria for narrowing the parameters for the proportions and therefore no branded look to the True Hearts diamond; each True Hearts is unique. The only thing that I could say about the True Hearts in terms of proportions is that they are consistently cut with a thicker girdle and therefore the spread of the diamond is reduced and you can see that 1.028 ct diamond falls short of a 6.5mm diameter.
However, James Allen provides what appears to be an idealscope image of the arrows view, although I have not found marketing material referring to the idealscope. However, on inspection of the html and flash elements of their website, it does seem that they label this image as an idealscope image. I selected the two diamonds that I was most concerned with from the above selection to have a closer look at their idealscope images.
Idealscope 1.04Idealscope 1.028
The image on the left is the 1.04 ct with a 34.0/40.6 CA/PA and the right image is of the 1.028 AGS diamond with a 35.3/40.8 CA/PA. If you read my tutorial on diamond grading certificates, you will know that the AGS stone would have been a 35.5 degree CA on a GIA lab report. I have to say that I am impressed because even these two diamonds that are on the edge of what I am comfortable with appear to have decent light performance with no visible leakage. The diamond on the left, which by the lab report would seem at risk to a shallow/shallow combination, has excellent light return and no visible leakage under the table. The diamond on the right also does not have leakage under the table but is right on the edge having partial light return.
1.04 actual image
1.02 actual image
You can see from these images that each diamond has a different contrast pattern under the table facet and whichever diamond you prefer is a matter of your personal preference. All I can say is that both of these are beautiful diamonds.
Finally lets have a look at the hearts images of both diamonds.
Hearts 1.02Hearts 1.04
Unless you are going to scrutinise these diamonds to the nth degree, I can see there are only minor flaws from slight yawing that should put off only the most particular of diamond prosumers. Both these diamonds are likely to be considered as H&A across the industry and they indeed are H&A diamonds to me.
Price
James Allen does not mention a Pricescope discount on their site but there have been reports that they do offer a discount when asked so make sure you do that. They also don’t list a bank wire price so its not a bad idea to ask them for one either as most vendors have a further discount on a bank wire. Now lets compare James Allen’s True Hearts prices to some of the other branded H&A that I have already reviewed.
A random 1.04 GVS2 True Heart was listed as $8,450. A quick check on Blue Nile shows that a 1.04 GVS2 Signature Ideal costs $8,922. On Whiteflash, a 1.015 GVS2 ACA costs $9,074. It appears that James Allen is cheaper than both Whiteflash and Blue Nile on comparable stones and seems to offer great value indeed even without any discount applied. When comparing similar carat stones on price, make sure you have a look at the difference in diameter, I have a suspicion that James Allen stones will be slighly smaller than some other makes for the same carat due to a thicker girdle.
Information Provided
James Allen True Hearts diamonds come in both GIA and AGS certified stones. This can add a certain element of confusion for their consumers, as it is one more thing to decide between. To discover your preference, you need to stay tuned for my next tutorial on the differences between the cut grading at GIA and AGS as well as other commonly believed differences between the labs. For this review, I won’t suggest that either is better than the other. Suffice to note that AGS diamonds come with a platinum light performance report that includes an ASET, which is nice for those that want a bit more light performance information on their diamond.
As seen in this review, James Allen provides an idealscope image and hearts image on their True Hearts line. If you don’t know where to find these images, look for this button and mouse over the hearts and arrows images.
True Hearts icon
From viewing many of these images, there are no issues that I have with their photography setup.
On top of all this, James Allen also provides a 40x magnified actual photograph of the diamond. This image can be useful for looking for any dark and obvious inclusions if you are looking at SI quality stones. However, just remember that many inclusions by their very nature require you to focus past the surface of the diamond in order to see them. In VS quality stones, I would not place too much weight into these pictures except for identifying any characteristic inclusions that are near the surface of the diamond.
James Allen also provides a video of the diamond as it rotates through 360 degrees. This is meant to allow you to determine whether the diamond is eye-clean. James Allen’s definition of eye-cleanliness is “clean to an unaided eye in a face-up position from a distance of 8 to 10 inches”. They also say that if you have questions regarding the eye-cleanliness, you can contact their gemmologists to assist you. I think this is important especially if you are looking for SI quality stones. Ask their gemmologist to show you where the worst inclusions can be seen on the diamond. Under the kind of magnification James Allen provides, I would be surprised if a professional gemmologist is unable to identify any over a 360 degree rotation of the diamond.
Finally, on their non-branded stones, James Allen also allows you to choose up to 3 diamonds to get idealscope images.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
James Allen’s Website is among one of the best that I have used. It provides a very useful filter that allows you to type in values or drag the bar if you wished. There are different view options that allow you to view thumbnails of the diamonds or in list view. Impressively, the website is just as fast and snappy in either view. In list view, you can quickly see the table, depth, and fluorescence information but you cannot see the measurements unless you actually click into the diamond. However, James Allen does provide all of this information including the crown and pavilion angles and girdle thickness without needing to access the lab report. Accessing the lab report is also very quick and easy and you will need to do this if you want to find out the lower girdle length.
The only issues I have with their site is that the background they use in their pictures make it very difficult to determine light leakage just from looking at the actual image. In my opinion, a light-grey background will make it more difficult to see leakage because the color of the background is similar to the color of the light being returned. One other thing I have noticed but cannot be certain about is that diamonds that are DEF seem a lot whiter than those that are GHI, probably due to lighting rather than actual color of the diamond. It would not surprise me if this were to enhance the look of the more expensive diamonds. Please just remember that information is only as good as the ability to properly interpret it.
Value Adding Information
James Allen provides a lifetime warranty that covers leaning, polishing, prong tightening and rhodium plating if you pay for the shipping of your ring to them and back. This warranty also covers the loss of side stones in your ring if the loss was not caused by damage. James Allen stresses the point that this warranty is not an insurance and you will still need insurance to protect against damage, theft or loss.
James Allen provides free FedEx worldwide shipping and has a 60-day return policy and they even pay for the return shipping for US customers, which is nice. This return policy is excellent and is above average for the industry.
James Allen also provides an upgrade policy, which is the same as Blue Nile. That is a 100% credit for spending double the price of your first time. This I would rate as below average for the industry. They will also provide you with a free quote you’re your other diamonds that are GIA/AGS/IGI certified diamonds over a half carat if you are looking to trade-in.
Conclusion
I have been thoroughly impressed with James Allen and I think that it provides a good compromise between Blue Nile’s business model and those of Whiteflash and Brian Gavin Diamonds. The True Hearts definitely live up to what they are marketed as, and I would even say that in my opinion that they are marketed conservatively. The only caveat is that not all True Hearts are made equally and you really have to look for those that suit your preference. This fact however may actually appeal to prosumers. For the information they provide and their pricing, James Allen is an excellent place for prosumers who want to use a little bit of effort to find their top performing diamonds at a great price. Finally, James Allen may be a great place to find your forever ring, but if you are looking for diamonds that you may want to upgrade regularly, there are other vendors that provide much better upgrade policies.
Brian Gavin Diamonds Review
Brian Gavin Diamonds carries 3 lines of round diamonds, their signature Hearts & Arrows, their Brian Gavin Blue, and their Brian Gavin Select. For this review, I will focus on the first two, as the Select line seems to be ‘selected’ generic round diamonds.
Brian Gavin Heart & Arrows
As always, I will first look at Brian Gavin Diamonds’s marketing material and see how their product stacks up. Brian Gavin Diamonds (BGD) markets their signature H&A as having “Optimum Performance” in terms of cut. They further go on to say that their objective is to enhance the ideal cut by creating “an ideal balance between optimum brilliance (return of light to the eye) and the scattering of light, or ‘fire’…” Towards the end of the marketing page, they finish by emphasising a “cut beyond brilliant” meaning that their signature-cut diamonds are “optically balanced for maximum visual performance”. In order to achieve this, BGD promises to sacrifice valuable carat weight without compromising the beauty of the diamond.
There are several ideas thrown into this marketing pitch that needs clarification for prosumers. First, it seems to suggest that there is such thing as optimum performance. Now my readers will know that I have been pointing out the fact that maximum light performance is not necessarily a good thing. Does that imply that there isn’t an optimum performance in diamonds? What BGD seems to tell us is that the BGD Hearts & Arrows is designed so that it achieves a balance.
My opinion is that it is definitely possible to design a diamond to have this balance between all the competing characteristics of diamond and that such a diamond may rightfully be considered optimum. That is, if all these characteristics are of equal importance to the consumer. But I will hazard a guess to say that a lot of people will have personal preference toward one characteristic or another, in the same way that some people prefer higher clarity and some people prefer a larger carat weight or colour. This highlights the importance of my next tutorial on the character of diamond in your purchasing decision.
The fact is, that optimum depends on your personal preference, but by purchasing a Brian Gavin signature Hearts & Arrows, you are choosing Brian’s preferences as to what is considered the optimum. Without going into further discussion on what will be covered in the tutorials, I will simply say that it is my opinion that to aim for a universally accepted version of optimal beauty takes away the romance of choosing a diamond by understanding your preference for a diamond’s character.
I randomly selected 6 GVS2 BGD Hearts & Arrows for this review.
Comparison Table
Lets look at the proportions for the BGD Signature Hearts & Arrows diamond. First, table percentage ranges from 56 to 57%. The first thing I think is ‘fine’, but as your knowledge of diamond grows, you may ask the question: “Why not 55%?”. Although a part of table percentage is consumer preference, it is an area that is also used to save weight sacrificing some fire by having a shorter crown. I only mention this because BGD claims to sacrifice carat weight to “optimise performance”.
The depth % ranges from 60.9 to 62%. I will take a closer look at the diamond with 62% depth later on. The crown angles in this selection range from 33.7 all the way to 34.9 degrees. At first glance, it seems like a variance of over one degree in crown angle suggests that the brand is not fixed on achieving a particular look in terms of light performance. Again, I will take a closer look at some of these diamonds in a bit.
Now compare the above with the pavilion angles. All but one diamond is cut to a pavilion angle of 40.9 degrees. Brian Gavin has gone on record to say that his father had trained him that there is no reason to cut a diamond to a pavilion angle of over 41 degrees unless the objective was to save weight. Whether this position is accurate is something that I would like to avoid in these reviews as these are areas where there is a wide range of differing views among vendors. For example, Karl K, a prosumer that I respect a lot and a diamond designer has stated several times that he has a soft spot for diamonds that are cut to a 34/41 CA/PA relationship. For my opinion on this matter, you will have to wait until my tutorial on the character of diamond.
It is sufficient to note in this review that this is obviously part of what Brian considers as his signature. It is entirely up to you, after all your research, whether your preferences are inline with him or not.
Let’s look at the lower girdle percentage. Unsurprisingly, these are cut to very precise lengths just like the pavilions with a range of 76 to 77%. Finally, the girdles themselves range in between 0.9% to 4%, with 4 out of the 6 diamonds having thin to medium girdles. It is difficult to form an opinion on the girdles, in this range, the thickness of the girdle does not affect the appearance of the diamonds. Whether there are other issues with regards to upper girdle indexing or ‘painting’ will have to be evaluated later. A detailed explanation of painting is a prosumer level 3 topic. For now, it is sufficient to think of painting as a way to manipulate the girdle, either to retain weight sacrificing contrast, or to increase light return by sacrificing weight. Again, BGD states that they would sacrifice weight for beauty, I would like to see if any of this weight is added by using girdle techniques.
Now lets go back and take a look at some of those red flags starting with the 62% depth. A closer look at the proportions of that diamond reminds me of typical proportions of an ACA. The 1.012 GVS2 serves as a good comparison stone. Below are the two idealscope images.
34.4:40.9 CAPA34.9:40.9 CAPA
Now if you haven’t read my tutorials on light performance you should go read it here. When we compare these idealscopes, focus on the relative reds within each individual idealscope image. The image on the left is the 1.012 GVS2 and the right is the 1.010 GVS2. What is evident is that the reds under the table on the left diamond is relatively darker than the reds in the rest of the diamond.
More subtle is the fact that I can see slight painting of the upper girdle facets, you can see this from the slightly darker shades of red in the upper girdle facets. Brian Gavin is a master of his craft, many of his diamonds exhibit what he terms crown-only painting. How crown-only painting affects the beauty of a diamond can only be decided by you. Don’t worry if all this blows over your head because these are prosumer level 3 topics. For now, just understand that they are techniques that cutters use to retain weight while maintaining the beauty of the diamond. Perhaps the only sacrifice is loosing some contrast at the edge of the diamond. However, I cannot fault BGD for doing this as it only makes commercial sense, although I still like my readers to be aware of this when making their decision.
The idealscope of the diamond on the right shows that the light return in this diamond under the table is weaker than the rest of the diamond. Unsuprisingly, this is consistent with the look of an ACA. What I can say with confidence is that these two diamonds have a different character and therefore it seems my previous observation that BGD signature Hearts & Arrows are not cut to any single particular look like the ACA seems to hold true. What this means is that the 62% depth is not something I would worry about.
Now lets have a closer look at the diamond with a 33.7 crown angle. Below is the idealscope image.
33.7:40.9 CAPA
First let me say that when we’re talking about super-ideal cut diamonds such as the BGD Hearts & Arrows, we can take proportions to greater limits than what I suggested as a general filter on Blue Nile in my tutorial on How to Pick Diamonds. Remember on the GIA diamond grading certificate the diamond above would be stated as 34/41. This may be what Karl K was on about when he said he had a soft spot for these diamonds because the reds on this diamond seems to be the most uniform out of all the ones I have reviewed so far. You can see that a 33.7 degree crown angle is very complementary to the 40.9 degree pavilion angle in terms of light return. Again, whether this is the diamond for you depends on whether you prefer it in terms of its character. Summarising so far, I have reviewed at least 3 diamonds all exhibiting a different character in terms of light performance alone.
Now some of you may look at the idealscope images and question the optical symmetry despite BGD’s reputation. I will use the 1.010 GVS2 above as my example. Below is a picture of the hearts image.
H&A
If you don’t know how to judge H&A, please read my tutorial on The Truth about Hearts and Arrows. All I can say is that this picture speaks for itself and truly represents what it means to purchase from Brian Gavin. The hearts image is the most reliable image to judge H&A, it really is all in the hearts. Just remember that when you look at idealscope images that you are looking at light performance whereas you are judging optical symmetry when looking at the hearts and you will do just fine.
Brian Gavin Blue
Brian Gavin Diamonds markets their blue line towards two kinds of consumers. The first kind are those who love the effect of fluorescence, the second kind are those who are seeking value for money. On Prosumer Diamonds, I am expecting my readers to know what fluorescence is and how its graded, and their general comfort level regarding fluorescence. What I do need to mention is that the GIA reports that around 20% of diamonds exhibiting very strong or strong blue fluorescence will have a hazy look to the diamond.
very strong fluorescence in direct daylight
very strong fluorescence in natural daylight
Notice the strong blue fluorescent diamond on the left vs a diamond with negligible fluorescence in both direct sunlight and natural daylight conditions.
Brian Gavin Diamonds addresses this concern by guaranteeing that the stone has “no negative effect on the diamond’s performance whatsoever”. The BGD Blue is also marketed to be cut to super-ideal proportions. An interesting thing is that right after this statement, BGD Blue’s are may have an AGS 1 grade in polish and symmetry. If this confuses you, perhaps you can check out my response to a post by blackprophet that can be found at this link.
Lets have a closer look at the BGD Blue’s to see if they really do represent such good value for money. Below are the specs of a random 1.013 GVS2 BGD Blue.
BGD Blue Proportions
Below is the idealscope.
BGD Blue Idealscope
From the idealscope, it seems that at least in terms of light performance, BGD’s claims hold true. However, because BGD tells us that the BGD Blue line can have physical symmetry issues, they are NOT marketing these as H&A. This should be obvious otherwise they would call these BGD Blue Hearts & Arrows!
BGD has been very smart about not making this point obvious while at the same time maintaining full disclosure, I would even go so far as to speculate that their signature H&A idealscope images are taken in order to make the symmetry issues in the BGD Blues less obvious. Of course, none of this is substantiated and you can make your own decisions.
When purchasing a BGD Blue, I recommend finding one that has AGS0 in both polish and symmetry grades. You can also try to request a hearts image for the stone in question. I have been made aware that some vendors that don’t post such information can still get it to you if you ask nicely.
The final point about purchasing a BGD blue is that you really go understand and manage your expectations with regards to purchasing a fluorescent stone. I will not mention here and there are a lot of resources out there, such as Pricescope Forum, that can help you figure this out. I will mention that fluorescence has a huge impact on price. It would not surprise me to find them up to 20% cheaper than comparable stones without fluorescence. Fluorescent stones are also harder to sell as the market for them is much smaller and therefore the resale value of these stones will likely be adversely affected.
Price
When you buy from Brian Gavin Diamonds, you are paying for a quality brand and craftsmanship. Do not expect the prices to be cheap, a 1.232ct HVS1 H&A was listed at a price of $12,144 and a 1.236 HVS1 BGD Blue was $10,088. Compare this to a 1.223 HVS1 ACA from Whiteflash listed at a price of $11,716 and a 1.260 HVS1 Expert Selection from Whiteflash listed at a price of $10,639. All of the prices above do not take into account any discounts so the first thing to do is ask if you can get a Pricescope discount of up to 5%.
Information Provided
The BGD H&A’s come standard with AGS Platinium Light Performance Report, actual picture, ASET, Idealscope, and Hearts Image. An eye-cleanliness assement will be given for SI1 and SI2 stones. It would be nice though if they could give more information such as the variances on their diamonds from a Sarin report. The BGD Blue’s don’t come with a hearts image but have an actual picture of the blue fluorescence. I have to mention that these pictures do seem to exaggerate the fluorescent effect. Please make sure you manage your expectations accordingly with your research. As for the information in general, they seem to be fairly standard and it would be nice to see more information regarding the variances of the proportions given.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
I think it may be best if I disclose the system that I am on. I currently use Mac OS 10.8.4 on Safari 6.0.5 viewing at a resolution of 1440×900. BGD makes it fairly easy to filter diamonds into their different lines. The only caveats I have found is that they do not allow me to type in values for carat weight and price so the user is forced to use the slider. Furthermore, the Clarity and Colour sliders are a bit difficult to use because SI1 and SI2 and the colour M show up on a different line and I can only tell my selection by the highlighted colour. It would be nice for them to add the ability to expand the diamond search to see more information about the diamonds such as thumbnails, but the speediness of the site makes up for it to some extent. I also find that their “Similar Diamonds” tab and “Diamond Comparison” tab seem to be more more user friendly as it only displays when I click on them and the 6 results returned also seem very helpful.
Value Adding Policies
BGD offers a 15-day inspection period on diamonds. This I would say is below industry average. BGD also has a lifetime upgrade program. For this please pay a bit more attention. BGD offers 100% of the original purchase price for upgrading a BGD Signature H&A diamond. If you are upgrading a BGD Blue, you get 100% of the original purchase if you upgrade to another BGD Blue. HOWEVER, if you upgrade to a BGD Signature H&A diamond, you ONLY receive 95% of the original purchase amount. Curious, but worth knowing! Also worth knowing is that the conditions of ALL upgrades require an upgrade of 2 of the following 3 stats: size, colour, or clarity. This is fancy wording for you must upgrade either 1 grade in colour or 1 grade in clarity even if you go for a stone that is only 0.01ct larger in size. I would rate this upgrade policy as average for the industry. It is also interesting to note that BGD will upgrade AGSL graded ACA stones graded between September 1998 and 30 November 2008. Finally there are $50 and $100 referral checks available depending on the referral purchase amount. For details, you can read it yourself at BGD’s website.
Conclusion
Brian Gavin Diamonds cut and sell some of the world’s most beautiful diamonds. They however do not have a particular look to them and therefore I find their claims that each one achieves optimum performance in all lighting conditions not to hold up. However, there are definitely perfectly cut diamonds that fit each individual’s personal preferences in terms of the character of the diamond. BGD excels in sculpting picture perfect hearts & arrows, but if this is what you want, you won’t find it easily in their BGD Blue line. The BGD Blue line is up to 20% cheaper than their signature H&A, but when compared to other vendors, there are cheaper options out there. Find a BGD Blue that is cut with the optical symmetry of a BGD H&A and I think you may have yourself a winning combination!
Brian Gavin Heart & Arrows
As always, I will first look at Brian Gavin Diamonds’s marketing material and see how their product stacks up. Brian Gavin Diamonds (BGD) markets their signature H&A as having “Optimum Performance” in terms of cut. They further go on to say that their objective is to enhance the ideal cut by creating “an ideal balance between optimum brilliance (return of light to the eye) and the scattering of light, or ‘fire’…” Towards the end of the marketing page, they finish by emphasising a “cut beyond brilliant” meaning that their signature-cut diamonds are “optically balanced for maximum visual performance”. In order to achieve this, BGD promises to sacrifice valuable carat weight without compromising the beauty of the diamond.
There are several ideas thrown into this marketing pitch that needs clarification for prosumers. First, it seems to suggest that there is such thing as optimum performance. Now my readers will know that I have been pointing out the fact that maximum light performance is not necessarily a good thing. Does that imply that there isn’t an optimum performance in diamonds? What BGD seems to tell us is that the BGD Hearts & Arrows is designed so that it achieves a balance.
My opinion is that it is definitely possible to design a diamond to have this balance between all the competing characteristics of diamond and that such a diamond may rightfully be considered optimum. That is, if all these characteristics are of equal importance to the consumer. But I will hazard a guess to say that a lot of people will have personal preference toward one characteristic or another, in the same way that some people prefer higher clarity and some people prefer a larger carat weight or colour. This highlights the importance of my next tutorial on the character of diamond in your purchasing decision.
The fact is, that optimum depends on your personal preference, but by purchasing a Brian Gavin signature Hearts & Arrows, you are choosing Brian’s preferences as to what is considered the optimum. Without going into further discussion on what will be covered in the tutorials, I will simply say that it is my opinion that to aim for a universally accepted version of optimal beauty takes away the romance of choosing a diamond by understanding your preference for a diamond’s character.
I randomly selected 6 GVS2 BGD Hearts & Arrows for this review.
Comparison Table
Lets look at the proportions for the BGD Signature Hearts & Arrows diamond. First, table percentage ranges from 56 to 57%. The first thing I think is ‘fine’, but as your knowledge of diamond grows, you may ask the question: “Why not 55%?”. Although a part of table percentage is consumer preference, it is an area that is also used to save weight sacrificing some fire by having a shorter crown. I only mention this because BGD claims to sacrifice carat weight to “optimise performance”.
The depth % ranges from 60.9 to 62%. I will take a closer look at the diamond with 62% depth later on. The crown angles in this selection range from 33.7 all the way to 34.9 degrees. At first glance, it seems like a variance of over one degree in crown angle suggests that the brand is not fixed on achieving a particular look in terms of light performance. Again, I will take a closer look at some of these diamonds in a bit.
Now compare the above with the pavilion angles. All but one diamond is cut to a pavilion angle of 40.9 degrees. Brian Gavin has gone on record to say that his father had trained him that there is no reason to cut a diamond to a pavilion angle of over 41 degrees unless the objective was to save weight. Whether this position is accurate is something that I would like to avoid in these reviews as these are areas where there is a wide range of differing views among vendors. For example, Karl K, a prosumer that I respect a lot and a diamond designer has stated several times that he has a soft spot for diamonds that are cut to a 34/41 CA/PA relationship. For my opinion on this matter, you will have to wait until my tutorial on the character of diamond.
It is sufficient to note in this review that this is obviously part of what Brian considers as his signature. It is entirely up to you, after all your research, whether your preferences are inline with him or not.
Let’s look at the lower girdle percentage. Unsurprisingly, these are cut to very precise lengths just like the pavilions with a range of 76 to 77%. Finally, the girdles themselves range in between 0.9% to 4%, with 4 out of the 6 diamonds having thin to medium girdles. It is difficult to form an opinion on the girdles, in this range, the thickness of the girdle does not affect the appearance of the diamonds. Whether there are other issues with regards to upper girdle indexing or ‘painting’ will have to be evaluated later. A detailed explanation of painting is a prosumer level 3 topic. For now, it is sufficient to think of painting as a way to manipulate the girdle, either to retain weight sacrificing contrast, or to increase light return by sacrificing weight. Again, BGD states that they would sacrifice weight for beauty, I would like to see if any of this weight is added by using girdle techniques.
Now lets go back and take a look at some of those red flags starting with the 62% depth. A closer look at the proportions of that diamond reminds me of typical proportions of an ACA. The 1.012 GVS2 serves as a good comparison stone. Below are the two idealscope images.
34.4:40.9 CAPA34.9:40.9 CAPA
Now if you haven’t read my tutorials on light performance you should go read it here. When we compare these idealscopes, focus on the relative reds within each individual idealscope image. The image on the left is the 1.012 GVS2 and the right is the 1.010 GVS2. What is evident is that the reds under the table on the left diamond is relatively darker than the reds in the rest of the diamond.
More subtle is the fact that I can see slight painting of the upper girdle facets, you can see this from the slightly darker shades of red in the upper girdle facets. Brian Gavin is a master of his craft, many of his diamonds exhibit what he terms crown-only painting. How crown-only painting affects the beauty of a diamond can only be decided by you. Don’t worry if all this blows over your head because these are prosumer level 3 topics. For now, just understand that they are techniques that cutters use to retain weight while maintaining the beauty of the diamond. Perhaps the only sacrifice is loosing some contrast at the edge of the diamond. However, I cannot fault BGD for doing this as it only makes commercial sense, although I still like my readers to be aware of this when making their decision.
The idealscope of the diamond on the right shows that the light return in this diamond under the table is weaker than the rest of the diamond. Unsuprisingly, this is consistent with the look of an ACA. What I can say with confidence is that these two diamonds have a different character and therefore it seems my previous observation that BGD signature Hearts & Arrows are not cut to any single particular look like the ACA seems to hold true. What this means is that the 62% depth is not something I would worry about.
Now lets have a closer look at the diamond with a 33.7 crown angle. Below is the idealscope image.
33.7:40.9 CAPA
First let me say that when we’re talking about super-ideal cut diamonds such as the BGD Hearts & Arrows, we can take proportions to greater limits than what I suggested as a general filter on Blue Nile in my tutorial on How to Pick Diamonds. Remember on the GIA diamond grading certificate the diamond above would be stated as 34/41. This may be what Karl K was on about when he said he had a soft spot for these diamonds because the reds on this diamond seems to be the most uniform out of all the ones I have reviewed so far. You can see that a 33.7 degree crown angle is very complementary to the 40.9 degree pavilion angle in terms of light return. Again, whether this is the diamond for you depends on whether you prefer it in terms of its character. Summarising so far, I have reviewed at least 3 diamonds all exhibiting a different character in terms of light performance alone.
Now some of you may look at the idealscope images and question the optical symmetry despite BGD’s reputation. I will use the 1.010 GVS2 above as my example. Below is a picture of the hearts image.
H&A
If you don’t know how to judge H&A, please read my tutorial on The Truth about Hearts and Arrows. All I can say is that this picture speaks for itself and truly represents what it means to purchase from Brian Gavin. The hearts image is the most reliable image to judge H&A, it really is all in the hearts. Just remember that when you look at idealscope images that you are looking at light performance whereas you are judging optical symmetry when looking at the hearts and you will do just fine.
Brian Gavin Blue
Brian Gavin Diamonds markets their blue line towards two kinds of consumers. The first kind are those who love the effect of fluorescence, the second kind are those who are seeking value for money. On Prosumer Diamonds, I am expecting my readers to know what fluorescence is and how its graded, and their general comfort level regarding fluorescence. What I do need to mention is that the GIA reports that around 20% of diamonds exhibiting very strong or strong blue fluorescence will have a hazy look to the diamond.
very strong fluorescence in direct daylight
very strong fluorescence in natural daylight
Notice the strong blue fluorescent diamond on the left vs a diamond with negligible fluorescence in both direct sunlight and natural daylight conditions.
Brian Gavin Diamonds addresses this concern by guaranteeing that the stone has “no negative effect on the diamond’s performance whatsoever”. The BGD Blue is also marketed to be cut to super-ideal proportions. An interesting thing is that right after this statement, BGD Blue’s are may have an AGS 1 grade in polish and symmetry. If this confuses you, perhaps you can check out my response to a post by blackprophet that can be found at this link.
Lets have a closer look at the BGD Blue’s to see if they really do represent such good value for money. Below are the specs of a random 1.013 GVS2 BGD Blue.
BGD Blue Proportions
Below is the idealscope.
BGD Blue Idealscope
From the idealscope, it seems that at least in terms of light performance, BGD’s claims hold true. However, because BGD tells us that the BGD Blue line can have physical symmetry issues, they are NOT marketing these as H&A. This should be obvious otherwise they would call these BGD Blue Hearts & Arrows!
BGD has been very smart about not making this point obvious while at the same time maintaining full disclosure, I would even go so far as to speculate that their signature H&A idealscope images are taken in order to make the symmetry issues in the BGD Blues less obvious. Of course, none of this is substantiated and you can make your own decisions.
When purchasing a BGD Blue, I recommend finding one that has AGS0 in both polish and symmetry grades. You can also try to request a hearts image for the stone in question. I have been made aware that some vendors that don’t post such information can still get it to you if you ask nicely.
The final point about purchasing a BGD blue is that you really go understand and manage your expectations with regards to purchasing a fluorescent stone. I will not mention here and there are a lot of resources out there, such as Pricescope Forum, that can help you figure this out. I will mention that fluorescence has a huge impact on price. It would not surprise me to find them up to 20% cheaper than comparable stones without fluorescence. Fluorescent stones are also harder to sell as the market for them is much smaller and therefore the resale value of these stones will likely be adversely affected.
Price
When you buy from Brian Gavin Diamonds, you are paying for a quality brand and craftsmanship. Do not expect the prices to be cheap, a 1.232ct HVS1 H&A was listed at a price of $12,144 and a 1.236 HVS1 BGD Blue was $10,088. Compare this to a 1.223 HVS1 ACA from Whiteflash listed at a price of $11,716 and a 1.260 HVS1 Expert Selection from Whiteflash listed at a price of $10,639. All of the prices above do not take into account any discounts so the first thing to do is ask if you can get a Pricescope discount of up to 5%.
Information Provided
The BGD H&A’s come standard with AGS Platinium Light Performance Report, actual picture, ASET, Idealscope, and Hearts Image. An eye-cleanliness assement will be given for SI1 and SI2 stones. It would be nice though if they could give more information such as the variances on their diamonds from a Sarin report. The BGD Blue’s don’t come with a hearts image but have an actual picture of the blue fluorescence. I have to mention that these pictures do seem to exaggerate the fluorescent effect. Please make sure you manage your expectations accordingly with your research. As for the information in general, they seem to be fairly standard and it would be nice to see more information regarding the variances of the proportions given.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
I think it may be best if I disclose the system that I am on. I currently use Mac OS 10.8.4 on Safari 6.0.5 viewing at a resolution of 1440×900. BGD makes it fairly easy to filter diamonds into their different lines. The only caveats I have found is that they do not allow me to type in values for carat weight and price so the user is forced to use the slider. Furthermore, the Clarity and Colour sliders are a bit difficult to use because SI1 and SI2 and the colour M show up on a different line and I can only tell my selection by the highlighted colour. It would be nice for them to add the ability to expand the diamond search to see more information about the diamonds such as thumbnails, but the speediness of the site makes up for it to some extent. I also find that their “Similar Diamonds” tab and “Diamond Comparison” tab seem to be more more user friendly as it only displays when I click on them and the 6 results returned also seem very helpful.
Value Adding Policies
BGD offers a 15-day inspection period on diamonds. This I would say is below industry average. BGD also has a lifetime upgrade program. For this please pay a bit more attention. BGD offers 100% of the original purchase price for upgrading a BGD Signature H&A diamond. If you are upgrading a BGD Blue, you get 100% of the original purchase if you upgrade to another BGD Blue. HOWEVER, if you upgrade to a BGD Signature H&A diamond, you ONLY receive 95% of the original purchase amount. Curious, but worth knowing! Also worth knowing is that the conditions of ALL upgrades require an upgrade of 2 of the following 3 stats: size, colour, or clarity. This is fancy wording for you must upgrade either 1 grade in colour or 1 grade in clarity even if you go for a stone that is only 0.01ct larger in size. I would rate this upgrade policy as average for the industry. It is also interesting to note that BGD will upgrade AGSL graded ACA stones graded between September 1998 and 30 November 2008. Finally there are $50 and $100 referral checks available depending on the referral purchase amount. For details, you can read it yourself at BGD’s website.
Conclusion
Brian Gavin Diamonds cut and sell some of the world’s most beautiful diamonds. They however do not have a particular look to them and therefore I find their claims that each one achieves optimum performance in all lighting conditions not to hold up. However, there are definitely perfectly cut diamonds that fit each individual’s personal preferences in terms of the character of the diamond. BGD excels in sculpting picture perfect hearts & arrows, but if this is what you want, you won’t find it easily in their BGD Blue line. The BGD Blue line is up to 20% cheaper than their signature H&A, but when compared to other vendors, there are cheaper options out there. Find a BGD Blue that is cut with the optical symmetry of a BGD H&A and I think you may have yourself a winning combination!
Blue Nile Review
Quality of the Blue Nile Signature Round diamond
Blue Nile Signature Round diamonds are marketed as “Hearts & Arrows” diamonds that also meet certain proportion requirements. For more information about proportions, please refer to the prosumer level 1 tutorials. The first thing to note is that a Blue Nile Signature Round is not a type of proprietary cut such as the Leo diamond; it is a brand. Blue Nile’s Signature diamonds are simply typical 57 facet modern brilliant cut round diamonds that are hand selected for their optical symmetry and light performance.
Hearts & ArrowsTable of Proportions
The images above are taken from Blue Nile’s own website. The image on the left represents what Blue Nile markets as a typical Blue Nile Signature Round diamond and resembles an image of a diamond seen under a Hearts & Arrows viewer.
However, Blue Nile does not normally provide pictures of your actual diamond in Hearts & Arrows viewer, idealscope, or ASET images. What they do provide is an additional GCAL certificate. Although the GCAL certificate may seem a bit difficult to understand, despite lacking clarity, there is some value to having a GCAL report. Aside from providing some information regarding optical symmetry and light performance, GCAL independently checks the diamond to see if it matches the GIA report, an important first step in verifying diamonds. On the GCAL certificate, the first useful bit of information can be seen in a photograph made through a microscope at 10x magnification. Below are photomicrographs of 2 Blue Nile Signature diamonds that I randomly selected. Both diamonds are around 1ct GVS2.
Enlarged Photomicrograph
Photomicrograph 2
The important thing to note is the images of the bottom (pavilion) because the flat table reduces the effect of any tilt in the diamond in photography. It is clear that the second diamond has a hearts view that resembles more of what Blue Nile advertises as typical from their signature range. From my experience, I have seen stones in their signature range that resemble much more closely to perfect hearts & arrows than these examples.
The GCAL report also provides some information about the light performance of the diamond in the Optical Brilliance Analysis and Optical Symmetry Analysis.
Optical Brilliance Analysis
In the above image of the first diamond, the areas of blue are the areas where there is leakage, this image is useful for noting the contrast pattern near the edge of the diamond where some leakage can be expected.
Optical Symmetry Analysis
The Optical Symmetry Analysis is in some ways redundant, as the information could have been gleaned from the photomicrograph and the brilliance analysis. However, the extent of the light leakage can be observed and the optical symmetry of the arrows is slightly clearer than in the photomicrograph. Do NOT confuse this image with that of an ASET.
Brilliance 2
Symmetry 2
Here are the same images from the second diamond. As you can see, there is more leakage under the table in the second stone. This demonstrates the fact that better optical symmetry does not necessarily mean better light performance; they are separate issues.
Price
The biggest advantage of buying from an online vendor is price. The profit margins for Blue Nile is public information as it is a publically traded US company. Their gross margin is 18% and their net margin is 2%. These numbers are to be taken as a reference only as they include all other aspects of running a business.
For non-signature round diamonds, Blue Nile’s business model works by compiling a large number of smaller vendor’s inventories into their virtual diamond database. The prices listed represent a mark-up on the smaller vendor’s stone of about 18%. Blue Nile actually owns their signature round diamonds and therefore the mark-ups for these are higher. However, it is not uncommon to find signature stones to be cheaper than some non-signature stones as Blue Nile does not control the prices of non-signature stones. In general, Blue Nile is priced very competitively as a diamond retailer.
Information Provided
Apart from the information provided on signature round diamonds, do not expect Blue Nile to be able to provide you with any other information than the GIA diamond certificate or AGS diamond certificate. As Blue Nile does not inspect the stone themselves on non-signature stones, all they can do is ask the jeweller that actually has the stone in possession to make a general comment about the stone in question.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
Blue Nile has a very quick, intuitive, and responsive search engine which seems to set the standard for other online vendors. It is very easy and quick to access the GIA diamond certificate for each diamond. Critical information about the table, depth, girdle thickness, fluorescence, and measurements are not immediately available and it would be nice to see them allow you to customise the information displayed in the search window rather than having to mouse-over the view button to see such information.
Search
I would also like to see them take the lead to implement the ability to filter diamonds by the girdle thickness, crown angles, and pavilion angles. Blue Nile also has a mobile app that is quite useful. One caveat is that you cannot apply advanced filtering options on the mobile app.
Value Adding Company Policies
Blue Nile offers pretty standard free shipping by courier. They also have a 30-day return policy, which is average at best. If you’re in China, the 30-day period starts from the day you order and you will lose a 20% reservation fee. It is the responsibility of the customer to insure the return package.
Blue Nile also provides an upgrade program for diamonds purchased after 1 January 2011. The biggest downfall of this upgrade program is that the upgrade must be at least 100% greater in price than the original diamond. Blue Nile also does NOT offer any buy-back policy.
Conclusion
The Blue Nile Signature Round range are diamonds that already have the highest approvals from GIA and AGS, most if not all of them can subjectively be called beautiful diamonds and that was never in doubt in this review.
Objectively, there are diamonds in the Blue Nile Signature Round diamonds that meet my prosumer requirements for both light performance and optical symmetry. However, these are rare and there is not easy way to look for them except for navigating each one’s GCAL report. I would recommend purchasing from Blue Nile if they are the cheapest solution for you and if you have found a diamond that displays excellent light performance and optical symmetry.
I would only recommend purchasing a non-signature diamond from Blue Nile if you have decided that optical symmetry is not important to you. However, choosing a diamond from Blue Nile requires you to be stricter in terms of choosing proportions for light performance.
I would NOT recommend purchasing a non-signature round from Blue Nile if you are dead set on a diamond with excellent optical symmetry or have high expectations in terms of light performance and have a goal of minimising light leakage. I would also not recommend purchasing from Blue Nile if you are uncomfortable with the procedures for returning a diamond to them, if you plan to use their trade-in policy, or if you view your diamond as money for a rainy day.
If you what I have mentioned does not concern you and you have the time and enjoy the process of personally searching for that needle in a haystack, it may be quite rewarding for you to search for a non-signature stone that also has decent light performance and optical symmetry. Otherwise, Blue Nile also serves as a great benchmark for negotiating with other vendors. In general, if you find a stone that is, say 20% cheaper than a comparable stone on Blue Nile, then you should exercise additional caution when making your purchase.
Blue Nile Signature Round diamonds are marketed as “Hearts & Arrows” diamonds that also meet certain proportion requirements. For more information about proportions, please refer to the prosumer level 1 tutorials. The first thing to note is that a Blue Nile Signature Round is not a type of proprietary cut such as the Leo diamond; it is a brand. Blue Nile’s Signature diamonds are simply typical 57 facet modern brilliant cut round diamonds that are hand selected for their optical symmetry and light performance.
Hearts & ArrowsTable of Proportions
The images above are taken from Blue Nile’s own website. The image on the left represents what Blue Nile markets as a typical Blue Nile Signature Round diamond and resembles an image of a diamond seen under a Hearts & Arrows viewer.
However, Blue Nile does not normally provide pictures of your actual diamond in Hearts & Arrows viewer, idealscope, or ASET images. What they do provide is an additional GCAL certificate. Although the GCAL certificate may seem a bit difficult to understand, despite lacking clarity, there is some value to having a GCAL report. Aside from providing some information regarding optical symmetry and light performance, GCAL independently checks the diamond to see if it matches the GIA report, an important first step in verifying diamonds. On the GCAL certificate, the first useful bit of information can be seen in a photograph made through a microscope at 10x magnification. Below are photomicrographs of 2 Blue Nile Signature diamonds that I randomly selected. Both diamonds are around 1ct GVS2.
Enlarged Photomicrograph
Photomicrograph 2
The important thing to note is the images of the bottom (pavilion) because the flat table reduces the effect of any tilt in the diamond in photography. It is clear that the second diamond has a hearts view that resembles more of what Blue Nile advertises as typical from their signature range. From my experience, I have seen stones in their signature range that resemble much more closely to perfect hearts & arrows than these examples.
The GCAL report also provides some information about the light performance of the diamond in the Optical Brilliance Analysis and Optical Symmetry Analysis.
Optical Brilliance Analysis
In the above image of the first diamond, the areas of blue are the areas where there is leakage, this image is useful for noting the contrast pattern near the edge of the diamond where some leakage can be expected.
Optical Symmetry Analysis
The Optical Symmetry Analysis is in some ways redundant, as the information could have been gleaned from the photomicrograph and the brilliance analysis. However, the extent of the light leakage can be observed and the optical symmetry of the arrows is slightly clearer than in the photomicrograph. Do NOT confuse this image with that of an ASET.
Brilliance 2
Symmetry 2
Here are the same images from the second diamond. As you can see, there is more leakage under the table in the second stone. This demonstrates the fact that better optical symmetry does not necessarily mean better light performance; they are separate issues.
Price
The biggest advantage of buying from an online vendor is price. The profit margins for Blue Nile is public information as it is a publically traded US company. Their gross margin is 18% and their net margin is 2%. These numbers are to be taken as a reference only as they include all other aspects of running a business.
For non-signature round diamonds, Blue Nile’s business model works by compiling a large number of smaller vendor’s inventories into their virtual diamond database. The prices listed represent a mark-up on the smaller vendor’s stone of about 18%. Blue Nile actually owns their signature round diamonds and therefore the mark-ups for these are higher. However, it is not uncommon to find signature stones to be cheaper than some non-signature stones as Blue Nile does not control the prices of non-signature stones. In general, Blue Nile is priced very competitively as a diamond retailer.
Information Provided
Apart from the information provided on signature round diamonds, do not expect Blue Nile to be able to provide you with any other information than the GIA diamond certificate or AGS diamond certificate. As Blue Nile does not inspect the stone themselves on non-signature stones, all they can do is ask the jeweller that actually has the stone in possession to make a general comment about the stone in question.
Ease of Searching for a Diamond
Blue Nile has a very quick, intuitive, and responsive search engine which seems to set the standard for other online vendors. It is very easy and quick to access the GIA diamond certificate for each diamond. Critical information about the table, depth, girdle thickness, fluorescence, and measurements are not immediately available and it would be nice to see them allow you to customise the information displayed in the search window rather than having to mouse-over the view button to see such information.
Search
I would also like to see them take the lead to implement the ability to filter diamonds by the girdle thickness, crown angles, and pavilion angles. Blue Nile also has a mobile app that is quite useful. One caveat is that you cannot apply advanced filtering options on the mobile app.
Value Adding Company Policies
Blue Nile offers pretty standard free shipping by courier. They also have a 30-day return policy, which is average at best. If you’re in China, the 30-day period starts from the day you order and you will lose a 20% reservation fee. It is the responsibility of the customer to insure the return package.
Blue Nile also provides an upgrade program for diamonds purchased after 1 January 2011. The biggest downfall of this upgrade program is that the upgrade must be at least 100% greater in price than the original diamond. Blue Nile also does NOT offer any buy-back policy.
Conclusion
The Blue Nile Signature Round range are diamonds that already have the highest approvals from GIA and AGS, most if not all of them can subjectively be called beautiful diamonds and that was never in doubt in this review.
Objectively, there are diamonds in the Blue Nile Signature Round diamonds that meet my prosumer requirements for both light performance and optical symmetry. However, these are rare and there is not easy way to look for them except for navigating each one’s GCAL report. I would recommend purchasing from Blue Nile if they are the cheapest solution for you and if you have found a diamond that displays excellent light performance and optical symmetry.
I would only recommend purchasing a non-signature diamond from Blue Nile if you have decided that optical symmetry is not important to you. However, choosing a diamond from Blue Nile requires you to be stricter in terms of choosing proportions for light performance.
I would NOT recommend purchasing a non-signature round from Blue Nile if you are dead set on a diamond with excellent optical symmetry or have high expectations in terms of light performance and have a goal of minimising light leakage. I would also not recommend purchasing from Blue Nile if you are uncomfortable with the procedures for returning a diamond to them, if you plan to use their trade-in policy, or if you view your diamond as money for a rainy day.
If you what I have mentioned does not concern you and you have the time and enjoy the process of personally searching for that needle in a haystack, it may be quite rewarding for you to search for a non-signature stone that also has decent light performance and optical symmetry. Otherwise, Blue Nile also serves as a great benchmark for negotiating with other vendors. In general, if you find a stone that is, say 20% cheaper than a comparable stone on Blue Nile, then you should exercise additional caution when making your purchase.
Reviews
Welcome to Vendor Reviews.
There are already many useful reviews that can be easily found on the internet. That is why my prosumer reviews will take a different approach to reviewing diamond vendors. I have found that it is unnecessary to repeat what has already been reported on other useful diamond websites and there is really no point in reviewing and comparing different vendors based on their inventories of regular unbranded loose diamonds.
In my reviews, I will be focusing on the following five areas: quality of their signature range, information provided, ease of searching for diamonds, price, and value adding company policies. These particular areas are what I find to be useful to my readers. However, I strongly urge all consumers to exercise caveat emptor or “buyer beware” when purchasing diamonds and do as much general research as is necessary before you are comfortable in making your purchase. Considerations such as reputation, convenience, customer service, and other value-added services ought to influence your purchasing decisions almost, if not as important, as what I will be reviewing.
There are already many useful reviews that can be easily found on the internet. That is why my prosumer reviews will take a different approach to reviewing diamond vendors. I have found that it is unnecessary to repeat what has already been reported on other useful diamond websites and there is really no point in reviewing and comparing different vendors based on their inventories of regular unbranded loose diamonds.
In my reviews, I will be focusing on the following five areas: quality of their signature range, information provided, ease of searching for diamonds, price, and value adding company policies. These particular areas are what I find to be useful to my readers. However, I strongly urge all consumers to exercise caveat emptor or “buyer beware” when purchasing diamonds and do as much general research as is necessary before you are comfortable in making your purchase. Considerations such as reputation, convenience, customer service, and other value-added services ought to influence your purchasing decisions almost, if not as important, as what I will be reviewing.
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