Diamond Rose Gold Ring, Lots Of Questions About My Ring

Q: I'm not much of a jewelry wearer but recently got married and so I now wear a wedding band. I have a number of questions regarding expectations of quality and what jewelers can and should do but also what the standard practice is in the field. Please bear with me, I'm a newbie. The ring in question is in the bottom two pictures on this page: http://www.ftupet.com/~tert/img/fg/rings.html

A: What colour is it showing up as in those spots? What is it that's making you think it's plated, and that the plating is wearing off? Always make sure you have a complete understanding of what it is you're asking for, and being offerred. Don't say yes to something and then decide to look into what it is. It will almost always end in trouble due to misconceptions and mis-understandings. You agreed to have the work done. That's time and materials the jeweller needed to spend on altering the ring. You have then, after the work you agreed to has been completed, decided you don't like it, and want the jeweller to spend hours and materials on again altering the ring or starting over from scratch for free? Tell you what. I'll employ you to dig a hole for me so I can install a swimming pool. Once it has been done I'll ask you to fill it in and dig it again, but a few feet over to the right. I wasn't sure it'd look good there anyway. But to hell with me paying you for the time and effort to dig the second hole. Oh, and can you make it oval instead of rectangular this time please? Would that work? I'd bet you'd be pretty bloody annoyed at me. Considering how much larger the centre diamond is, it would not be able to be set into the existing ring the same way as the other 2 diamonds have been. For the simple reason that the pavillion and the culet (the very tip of the bottom of the diamond) would stick out the back a fair way, and scratch the finger quite severely. So to get around this the top of the ring needs to be built up. One way to do this (cheapest and easiest way) is to stick a bezel on there and set the diamond into that. Putting a claw setting there would also help, but in my opinion wouldn't look anywhere near as nice. If the ring were to be made again in the original style, but to accomodate the larger diamond, the top of the ring would be quite thick, and wouldn't look as nice on the finger. It would also cost a fair bit more for all the extra gold. Filling in holes can be done, but making sure there's no sign of the holes is trickier. If the jeweller has some white gold from the same alloy mix as the ring is made of, that would help ensure a colour match with the gold. But then there's the solder. And that's almost certainly going to be a different colour. It may be only a slight difference, but it would still be noticable. So to make it look uniform in colour, a common practice is to rhodium plate the white gold parts of the ring. That will give it a nice bright white look, and will be uniform. But it will wear over time and then you may possibly see the colour differences again. If you don't want to be re-plating the ring every now and then, you'll need to look at throwing money into having the ring made again from scratch. I doubt the centre stone is picking up the rose gold, unless it's set into rose gold. And even then, probably not. I'd dare say the centre stone is a lower quality. If you want a nice, white, large diamond to match the other two, be prepared to pay big dollars. Conversly you could have lower quality side diamonds to match the centre stone (considering the centre one has sentimental value to you). That would be alot cheaper than the first option. Sometimes this is an optical illusion. I've been frustrated by rings that measure spot on at all points, but still for some strange reason they just look wrong. So it's a matter of throwing away the measuring callipers and going by eye. After all in day-to-day life it's the eye that needs to be pleased, not the measuring equipment. This is one point I'll grant you. If you've paid a fair bit for the ring, you may reasonably expect the work to be done well. Whether you like it or not is another matter of course. ;-) Overall, it would appear to me that the jeweller simply did as they were asked. It's unfortunate that the assistant didn't get your message to the correct person in time (or at all as the case may be), but sadly that's life sometimes. And if you didn't have a complete understanding of what they were talking about, you should have.... A) asked for a clearer explanation and/or B) gone away to research and then gone back to them with a yay or nay. As for the plating issue, if you had some clear pics or could better describe why you feel it's been plated we might be able to suggest reasons, or point your understanding in the right direction. It's a nice looking ring though. I quite like it's fairly simple design. I'm not much of a jewellery wearer (cue the "plumbers tap is always leaking" type comments) but that's a style I would be happy to wear.

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