Diamond rings may be more surprising than you think

You will be in for a nice surprise if you think that engagement and wedding rings are either a plain gold band or a stone or stones in a plain setting. The choice and range out there is simply stunning, not only are the days of plain gold bands long gone, but you can choose materials you may not even have heard of. Increasingly popular are palladium rings as a setting for your diamonds. That was a new material to me, though I had already heard of platinum and silver, patterned gold and zirconium and even titanium. Each brings a new look and feel to a traditional gift. Because it’s all detailed and set out online you can research the new materials to see their pros and cons until you know exactly what you want. Diamond rings come in many settings too, from the traditional to the exotic and up to the minute designer specials that are created with a special cut or diamond in mind. Even titanium jewelry can start at under thirty pounds and for that special occasion you can have it engraved too with a special message. Of course you can spend a lot or a little on rings and jewelry but one thing is certain, the best bargains are online, that’s for sure. The prices are simply unbeatable and that’s because all the savings of using the latest technologies are passed on to you. The sites are easy to navigate and a mine of useful information. Good quality diamonds have a sparkle and a lustre that comes from within and strikes out in every direction.

Diamond rings can be blindingly brilliant or subtly stunning, carats are given a points scale, and one carat equals 100 points, that means it’s easy to tell the size of a diamond when expressed in points, 33 is for example 0.333 of a carat. The bigger the stone the more it is likely to cost, although flaws and depth and clarity of colour have a major impact upon price too. Diamonds are categorized as to clarity and the scale runs from flawless, FL, to small inclusions or flaws, I1, I2, I3. Because they are categorized you know exactly what you are buying and that is reassuring. When it comes to colour, with diamonds, the most expensive are the colourless ones, even if a trained eye can detect the faintest of colours. Fancy diamonds in colours like red diamonds, yellow diamonds, pink, blue and green, command a good price too because of their rarity value. The actual shape varies enormously and will reflect the overall shape of the raw stone the cutter is faced with. Expertly cut, the stone bounces light from facet to facet until the light appears to shine from within rather than reflected from an outside source. There’s an explosion in online demand for stones and diamond rings, retailers have fought to bring every variety, colour and shape of stone to us. Now is the time to take advantage.