Recut, Reshape, and Reset an Heirloom Engagement Ring

Inheriting a family engagement ring as a substitute of buying new is a sentimental (and generous) reward—until you don’t similar to the stone, setting, or kind. Nevertheless whether or not or not you’re attempting to change the shape, add just a bit further sparkle, or commerce a yellow gold setting for platinum, expert jewelers may assist you customise a pre-loved diamond right into a bit you’ll be utterly pleased sporting for the rest of your life. 

Right here is each half it is good to search out out about some great benefits of heirloom stones and the best way it is best to (and mustn’t) change them everytime you make them your private, in accordance with two diamond specialists.

The Benefits of Using an Heirloom Diamond

A diamond is perpetually—which suggests the similar stone your great-grandmother donned a century previously can reside a second life as a result of the centerpiece of your private engagement ring (or your fiancé’s). 

Handed down means further sustainable.

Though the diamond commerce has made a great deal of progress with its sourcing and sustainability initiatives, heirloom diamonds—like something you reuse, from thrifted sweaters to classic furnishings—have a lower carbon footprint than newly-mined and even lab-grown alternate choices. Plus, traditional stones aren’t meant to reside in a area. “Diamonds are purported to closing perpetually if taken care of accurately, so to have the flexibility to placed on it each day as a substitute of it sitting someplace in a jewelry area or protected is an efficient alternative,” says jewelry designer Jennie Kwon. 

There are financial perks to a family stone.

Though it’s a delusion that an engagement ring should worth as so much as three months’ wage, diamonds nonetheless aren’t low-cost. Using a traditional stone—significantly one which’s larger readability, has greater shade, or is bigger than the model new stones that fall inside your funds—means that you can focus your spending on the setting, totally different wedding ceremony costs, or future payments. “No particular person goes to argue with the reality that diamonds are costly!” says Kwon. “For a consumer who has an heirloom stone on the market to them, the selection of repurposing that stone and saving your self from having to spend cash on one different makes good sense!”

You’ll honor a family’s legacy.

Incorporating a stone with sentimental ties to your family members (or your affiliate’s) supplies a good deeper layer of meaning to your engagement piece. “Just a few of the diamonds we work with have been throughout the family for just some generations, and to think about the historic previous linked to that one stone, what it’s seen in its lifetime, is pretty very good,” says Kwon. “There’s a wide range of meaning behind persevering with in order so as to add onto that story by giving that diamond yet another life.”

Jewelry designer Ari Madilian of Single Stone sometimes works with {{couples}} who choose to give attention to heirloom stones. “How pretty is it determining that you just’re sporting a bit that was in your family members for just a few years and belonged to any individual you appreciated,” he says. “The sustainability and value monetary financial savings are merely the icing on the cake.”

Make an Heirloom Diamond Your Private

Some classic settings not at all exit of favor—nonetheless others look larger than just a bit outdated by the purpose they purchase heirloom standing. “Not that there’s something unsuitable with the ‘80s and ‘90s, nonetheless a wide range of our customers will ship dated designs to us from this era, or designs that mainly don’t resonate with them personally,” says Kwon. “Sometimes the gadgets they convey about in are too chunky for his or her model, or too fussy.”

Whether or not or not the diamond you’ve been given is in a setting that’s to not your model, is cut back proper right into a kind that doesn’t suit your aesthetic, or just needs some expert TLC, the specialists present these dos and don’ts for giving it a personalized makeover.

Do: Enhance the state of affairs.

Some rings need little larger than what Madilian refers to as a spa day: a deep clear and minor repairs. “That’s as soon as we take away the center stone and restore and polish any damages it might need sustained with years of injury,” he says. “The outcomes will ship once more luster to a colored gem or brilliance once more to a diamond.  If it is a passed-down piece, this may also symbolize the current start for the one who can be the brand new wearer.”

Don’t: Reduce down the diamond.

If the women in your family members favored their diamonds huge and daring whenever you favor your jewelry understated and minimalist, it might be tempting to have a giant diamond trimmed down—nonetheless every specialists warn in opposition to this. “As cautious as a diamond- or stonecutter may be, there is not a guarantee {{that a}} stone, and way more so an older one, will not be damaged throughout the course of,” says Kwon. Even when your stone survives, you’ll nonetheless end up shedding a substantial quantity of the distinctive (and increasingly more unusual) gem supplies. Instead, take into consideration your heirloom diamond a helpful asset you might promote or cross down eventually—or commerce it in to purchase one factor a lot much less flashy.

Do: Change the setting.

A personalized setting affords nearly infinite selections for personalizing a traditional stone: Determine in your favorite metallic, add side stones in a definite kind or shade, or set the stone larger or lower. “One factor as refined as setting a stone lower or larger throughout the setting or modifying the type of the prongs may alter how the piece is perceived,” says Madilian. “That’s when the experience and the communication of the jeweler you are employed with turns into important.”

Kwon agrees: “For those who want to give your heirloom stone new life, that’s the manner wherein to go!” she says. “A simple facelift or change in design may make you fall in love with a bit that’s been sitting unworn for years.”

Don’t: Change the shape.

Chopping a diamond proper right into a new kind poses the similar challenges as decreasing it for measurement, along with damaging the integrity of the stone and slashing the price. “There are restricted circumstances the place this is perhaps doable,” says Madilian. “For example, in some circumstances, you’ll be able to recut a princess cut back proper right into a square-step cut back, or a marquis into an oval. Oftentimes, altering the type of the stone ends in important weight discount and is not a financially good alternative.”

The exception: “We’ll and do sometimes rearrange the faceting on a stone to current it a really utterly totally different brilliance aesthetic with out altering its common kind,” says Madilian. “A giant, warm-colored, older cut back stone may look a lot much less flashy on account of its faceting pattern than a so much smaller stylish stone.”

Do: Change the silhouette.

In case you really can’t reside with a diamond throughout the kind you’ve inherited, a personalized setting can alter the silhouette, says Kwon. Her Interval setting, throughout which a spherical solitaire is about proper right into a sq. physique, is one occasion; a diamond halo can also soften the corners of square-cut diamond or add definition to a spherical cut back. “Consumers are shocked at how merely altering the setting may make a positive cut back—that they weren’t large into sooner than—enchantment to them,” says Kwon.

Don’t: Destroy a one-of-a-kind piece.

In some circumstances, your jeweler may recommend in opposition to redesigning an heirloom ring altogether—significantly when it’s a really distinctive work that will’t be recreated. “For instance, we love the Paintings Deco interval, and when customers have an real Paintings Deco interval ring, we inform them to keep up it the best way wherein it is, as a result of it is like a little bit of art work,” says Kwon.

Do: Choose a model new wedding ceremony band.

A complementary wedding ceremony band can play a surprisingly big half throughout the common look of your wedding ceremony set, whereas making an outdated model engagement ring look further updated. “Some customers who’re on the fence about redesigning an heirloom piece uncover the freshness and alter they’re looking out for by merely together with a up to date band that they wish to pair with the piece,” says Kwon. “The pairing of outdated and new can create a extraordinarily cool, eclectic, curated vibe that isn’t as easy to recreate with two new gadgets.”

Madilian moreover makes use of this technique when resetting a stone isn’t an alternative. “We’ll sometimes advise on strategies to kind the ring in any other case by together with quite a few bands, which can drastically change the final look of a hoop on the hand,” says Madilian.