Not Normal
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Do you people know how much diamonds cost?
- Thread starter kbate
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D
DesEsseintes
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I must be very lucky. I am quite prepared to accept that my experience is not the norm.
evesdream
perfect fifth
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It's all about the cut, anyway.
To be honest if I could do it over again I'd ask him to get me a 72-note Reuge music box instead. If you've ever heard one you'd know why.
And also, I'm not sure if we changed, but our relationship changed for the better after we got married.
Mazel tov, kbate.
IrezumiKiss
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B
Bookishleigh
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Congratulations!
And thank you for the reminder that I have another item I can be selling right now
And thank you for the reminder that I have another item I can be selling right now
Ishmael
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You may be paying for the Emerald (if it's worth a damn). On the price/ct scale Rubies (especially Burmese) are #1, Emeralds are second, and Diamonds come in third.
Take her to Murfreesboro, AR and let her dig up her own diamond. You can pay for the setting.
Ishmael
Take her to Murfreesboro, AR and let her dig up her own diamond. You can pay for the setting.
Ishmael
Noor
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I would have been happy with his favorite synthesizer and/or title to his old corvette Just kidding, I don't/didn't really care about such things, at least not with him.
I am sure he would been quite happy with a gold band with some sort of symbolic thing in it or on it, and wear it on one hand for engagement and switch to the other for marriage.
I had already inadvertently given him what he considered "jewelry" which he accepted as such after much deliberation with himself, so I guess we already had the important jewelry things done.
Just kidding, I don't/didn't really care about such things, at least not with him.I am sure he would been quite happy with a gold band with some sort of symbolic thing in it or on it, and wear it on one hand for engagement and switch to the other for marriage.
I had already inadvertently given him what he considered "jewelry" which he accepted as such after much deliberation with himself, so I guess we already had the important jewelry things done.
Noor
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As far as diamonds, most diamonds I have seen in this country don't have much fire. I am not so interested in size, but they are kind of fun when you can see them sparkling across the room, regardless of size.
I have seen fairly nice ones in Antwerp and some they were purchased in Israel. I have an eye for diamonds, pearls and oriental rugs. Ones that I think are nice, and understated usually turn out to be the most expensive ones. I can pick out the best of the them without trying. This can be problematic.
I have seen fairly nice ones in Antwerp and some they were purchased in Israel. I have an eye for diamonds, pearls and oriental rugs. Ones that I think are nice, and understated usually turn out to be the most expensive ones. I can pick out the best of the them without trying. This can be problematic.
tonyroleplays
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Diamonds as the vital stone of an engagement/wedding ring is a farce.
The concept of the necessity of a big diamond engagement ring to declare your eternal love is the result of a 1930-40s advertising campaign by DeBeers. Vast diamond deposits had recently been discovered in South Africa (and South West Africa, now called Namibia) at the same time that the depression and cultural shifts in the US and Western Europe were causing interest in diamonds to wane. DeBeers and others needed to raise demand for diamonds, and they did so by blitzing the papers and radio with such phrases as "A diamond is forever", which was meant to imply that if you bought your fiancée one, your marriage would be forever, too. Yeah, that's true, isn't it?
Scotts did the same with clover and Weed and Feed. Clover had been a treasured plant in lawns of mansions and other upscale homes for decades, filling lawns with wonderful swathes of white or red flower buds ... oceans of white that were magnificent. But then Scotts -- the leading manufacturer of lawn chemicals at the time -- created a weed and feed that could make even the saddest of lawns green and weed free. The only problem was that it also killed clover. So they started a vast advertising campaign declaring clover a weed and pest grass, warning parents that clover attracted bees and made their lawns unsafe for children and other fallacies.
Coke and Pepsi ... sugar and corn syrup. Have you ever wondered why soda pop in the US is sweetened with corn syrup but is sweetened with sugar throughout most of the rest of the world? An embargo of foreign sugar in an attempt to protect American sugar cane producers drove sugar prices so high that most sweet treat manufacturers switched to corn syrup and, at the same time, began extolling the virtues of their product and the dangers of pure cane sugar in multi-million dollar advertising campaigns.
Don't believe everything you hear or read. In fact, don't believe what I've written here, either. Look it up. You'll be amazed at the SHIT with which advertisers and others fill your head.
"Your call is important to us..."
Jesus, really...? If it was, you'd answer the fucking phone.
Whew... felt good to get that off my chest.
The concept of the necessity of a big diamond engagement ring to declare your eternal love is the result of a 1930-40s advertising campaign by DeBeers. Vast diamond deposits had recently been discovered in South Africa (and South West Africa, now called Namibia) at the same time that the depression and cultural shifts in the US and Western Europe were causing interest in diamonds to wane. DeBeers and others needed to raise demand for diamonds, and they did so by blitzing the papers and radio with such phrases as "A diamond is forever", which was meant to imply that if you bought your fiancée one, your marriage would be forever, too. Yeah, that's true, isn't it?
Scotts did the same with clover and Weed and Feed. Clover had been a treasured plant in lawns of mansions and other upscale homes for decades, filling lawns with wonderful swathes of white or red flower buds ... oceans of white that were magnificent. But then Scotts -- the leading manufacturer of lawn chemicals at the time -- created a weed and feed that could make even the saddest of lawns green and weed free. The only problem was that it also killed clover. So they started a vast advertising campaign declaring clover a weed and pest grass, warning parents that clover attracted bees and made their lawns unsafe for children and other fallacies.
Coke and Pepsi ... sugar and corn syrup. Have you ever wondered why soda pop in the US is sweetened with corn syrup but is sweetened with sugar throughout most of the rest of the world? An embargo of foreign sugar in an attempt to protect American sugar cane producers drove sugar prices so high that most sweet treat manufacturers switched to corn syrup and, at the same time, began extolling the virtues of their product and the dangers of pure cane sugar in multi-million dollar advertising campaigns.
Don't believe everything you hear or read. In fact, don't believe what I've written here, either. Look it up. You'll be amazed at the SHIT with which advertisers and others fill your head.
"Your call is important to us..."
Jesus, really...? If it was, you'd answer the fucking phone.
Whew... felt good to get that off my chest.
Equinoxe
Not a pod person
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I must offer my well-wishes and congratulations—and I do know how much diamonds cost, and the reasons for it, though I shan't imagine that alone makes me much help in your situation.
I am very happy for you, even if it is a mere formality.
I am very happy for you, even if it is a mere formality.
Yardley
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If you think rings are expensive, wait till you start hearing from friends about the cost of giving or taking it back.
Can I interest you in a very nice platinum setting with some modest sized investment grade stones in it?
To your original question, I haven't priced diamonds lately. A couple of decades ago the stones were far more costly than the platinum. Last I checked diamonds had fallen out of favor and the price of platinum was through the roof. The diamonds were worth less than the ring itself.
I see no reason anyone cannot marry anyone they wish to, but I fail to see how being gay is going to reverse the trend in society for delaying or avoiding marriage.
I am a hopeless romantic though. I want to believe that someone out there means forever when they say it. I hope that gays and lesbians rejuvenate the currently failing institution of marriage. You know the weddings will be fabulous.
Can I interest you in a very nice platinum setting with some modest sized investment grade stones in it?
To your original question, I haven't priced diamonds lately. A couple of decades ago the stones were far more costly than the platinum. Last I checked diamonds had fallen out of favor and the price of platinum was through the roof. The diamonds were worth less than the ring itself.
I see no reason anyone cannot marry anyone they wish to, but I fail to see how being gay is going to reverse the trend in society for delaying or avoiding marriage.
I am a hopeless romantic though. I want to believe that someone out there means forever when they say it. I hope that gays and lesbians rejuvenate the currently failing institution of marriage. You know the weddings will be fabulous.
No one thinks we will rejuvenate the institution or have greater success or greater longevity of marriage than the national norm. What we will have is legal equality without having to fight 50 battles in 50 states and then still fight in the federal courts for national reciprocity and recognition.
Certainly though, there will be a surge in the weddings business for the next few years as half a million or more gay couples marry - and in 3 or 4 years, a surge in divorces as well as we begin to discover that we can make the same mistakes as traditional woman/man couples.
thør
Karhu-er
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I will just urge you once more not to pay retail. On the secondary market you'll pay about half of what you would from a retail store. Unless you're talking a signed designer piece, supper high quality like a vvs clarity with an E color or a high end retailer like Tiffany's. They'll command a higher price. Even if she's not fond of antiques you can find modern pieces on the secondary market. Antique jewelry in general and diamonds in particular my area of expertise. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
Most importantly congrats to the two of you!
Most importantly congrats to the two of you!
Last edited:
Libsam
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Here's a tin foil ring for you.
The Engagement Ring Story: How De Beers Created a Multi-Billion Dollar Industry From the Ground Up
I'm sure you know De Beers are Jews, right?
Mello_SixtyNine
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Diamonds are not that rare:
Although you won't stumble across a diamond while digging in your tomato garden, they are far more common than their cost suggests. The big gem companies aggressively control the supply that arrives at market, creating artificial scarcity and high prices.
This practice was born in the diamond fields of South Africa in the 1880s, when Cecil Rhodes, the chairman of De Beers Consolidated Mines, discovered that he could inflate prices at will simply by locking up the rights to every diamond mine he could find. His successor, Ernest Oppenheimer, developed a complex network of wholesalers that gave De Beers effective control of up to 90 percent of the world's rough-diamond trade through most of the 20th century, as the company hoarded stones in basement vaults and doled them out strategically.
The Oppenheimer family's iron grip on the global supply chain fell apart in the 1990s when Alrosa, a diamond company owned by the Russian government, and the Argyle Diamond Mine in Australia began to sell their stones independently. De Beers's share of the rough-diamond trade is now 40 percent and falling.
Interestingly, though, the end of the De Beers monopoly has not led to aggressive underbidding: Everyone involved seems to recognize that price wars could kill the diamond goose. And stockpiling still happens. Although a healthy 163 million carats or so are mined annually, a certain amount of that yield is withheld from the marketplace. Alrosa, in particular, sold a substantial percentage of its diamonds to a metals bank in 2009 rather than risk flooding the market in shaky economic times.
I would recommend buying a man-made diamond. Chemically, they are identical to mined diamonds.
You won't be able to tell the difference between a lab-grown diamond and a mined diamond. If you go to the legitimate sources, you'll find that their gems are essentially the same as mined diamonds. The gems have the same physical and chemical properties as mined diamonds. The proper names for these diamonds are laboratory-created, lab-grown, or man-made diamonds.
It's cheaper. Although the price varies on different diamonds depending on the shape, cut, carat, clarity, and color, president and CEO Stephen Lux of Gemesis Diamond Company, a producer of lab-created diamonds, says, "Generally speaking, Gemesis lab-created diamonds retail for approximately 20 to 30 percent less than mined diamonds." Lux gave sample prices of what you can expect to see at Gemesis — a 0.50 carat can range from $500 to $2,500, while a 1.00 carat can go from $2,000 to $8,000.
The drawbacks. The main drawback seems to be the limits to the size of the diamonds, perhaps due to the technology and equipment of the producer. Gemesis sells colorless diamonds in sizes ranging from 0.50 to 1.50 carats, but it does have bigger sizes for colored diamonds. Another negative is the unromantic notion that the gem is created in a few days vs. taking millions of years to form.
Personally, I'd go with meteorite wedding bands:
http://www.meteorite-rings.com/Meteorite-Rings-25/Meteorite-Rings-25.jpg
https://img0.etsystatic.com/034/0/8348863/il_fullxfull.647595458_gua5.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/fLQvI.jpg
BONUS! This one comes with dinosaur bone too:
https://jewelrybyjohan.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/IMG_4418455c_500x500.jpg
Although you won't stumble across a diamond while digging in your tomato garden, they are far more common than their cost suggests. The big gem companies aggressively control the supply that arrives at market, creating artificial scarcity and high prices.
This practice was born in the diamond fields of South Africa in the 1880s, when Cecil Rhodes, the chairman of De Beers Consolidated Mines, discovered that he could inflate prices at will simply by locking up the rights to every diamond mine he could find. His successor, Ernest Oppenheimer, developed a complex network of wholesalers that gave De Beers effective control of up to 90 percent of the world's rough-diamond trade through most of the 20th century, as the company hoarded stones in basement vaults and doled them out strategically.
The Oppenheimer family's iron grip on the global supply chain fell apart in the 1990s when Alrosa, a diamond company owned by the Russian government, and the Argyle Diamond Mine in Australia began to sell their stones independently. De Beers's share of the rough-diamond trade is now 40 percent and falling.
Interestingly, though, the end of the De Beers monopoly has not led to aggressive underbidding: Everyone involved seems to recognize that price wars could kill the diamond goose. And stockpiling still happens. Although a healthy 163 million carats or so are mined annually, a certain amount of that yield is withheld from the marketplace. Alrosa, in particular, sold a substantial percentage of its diamonds to a metals bank in 2009 rather than risk flooding the market in shaky economic times.
I would recommend buying a man-made diamond. Chemically, they are identical to mined diamonds.
You won't be able to tell the difference between a lab-grown diamond and a mined diamond. If you go to the legitimate sources, you'll find that their gems are essentially the same as mined diamonds. The gems have the same physical and chemical properties as mined diamonds. The proper names for these diamonds are laboratory-created, lab-grown, or man-made diamonds.
It's cheaper. Although the price varies on different diamonds depending on the shape, cut, carat, clarity, and color, president and CEO Stephen Lux of Gemesis Diamond Company, a producer of lab-created diamonds, says, "Generally speaking, Gemesis lab-created diamonds retail for approximately 20 to 30 percent less than mined diamonds." Lux gave sample prices of what you can expect to see at Gemesis — a 0.50 carat can range from $500 to $2,500, while a 1.00 carat can go from $2,000 to $8,000.
The drawbacks. The main drawback seems to be the limits to the size of the diamonds, perhaps due to the technology and equipment of the producer. Gemesis sells colorless diamonds in sizes ranging from 0.50 to 1.50 carats, but it does have bigger sizes for colored diamonds. Another negative is the unromantic notion that the gem is created in a few days vs. taking millions of years to form.
Personally, I'd go with meteorite wedding bands:
http://www.meteorite-rings.com/Meteorite-Rings-25/Meteorite-Rings-25.jpg
https://img0.etsystatic.com/034/0/8348863/il_fullxfull.647595458_gua5.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/fLQvI.jpg
BONUS! This one comes with dinosaur bone too:
https://jewelrybyjohan.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/IMG_4418455c_500x500.jpg
Last edited:
Noor
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Cecil Rhodes created the diamond cartel De Beers Consolidated Mines in 1888. He used the cartel to control the world’s diamond markets, and create the myth of diamond scarcity. He wasn't Jewish.
the Oppenheimer family, probably Jewish, owned DeBeers since the 1920s until 2011 when they sold out to the mining company Anglo American, not Jewish.
The whole system of creating scarcity stems from Cecil Rhodes who was at it for about 35 years.
Yes, yes, yes, DeBeers artificially created and influenced the rarity and value of diamonds. Yes, Yes and Yes, many are mined in near slavery conditions and in horrible circumstance. Yes, Oh My God! Jews may be involved! Horror!
None of that is the point.
The point is that I might have a reason to buy one of the damned things because the silly bitch I might be marrying in a few months said she'd want one. Us being a traditionalist type of relationship of course, we want to be right there in the middle of the American norms for how we do this.
None of that is the point.
The point is that I might have a reason to buy one of the damned things because the silly bitch I might be marrying in a few months said she'd want one. Us being a traditionalist type of relationship of course, we want to be right there in the middle of the American norms for how we do this.
Laurel
Kitty Mama
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http://i2.cdn.turner.com/money/dam/assets/141104171034-natural-sapphire-company-340xa.jpg
Maybe a diamond isn't every girl's best friend.
More brides to be are choosing non-traditional engagement rings over the standard white diamond solitaire that has adorned women's left hands for so long.
Jewelers across the country are reporting an increase in couples looking for alternatives like colored diamonds, gemstones and bands to symbolize their commitment.
New York-based jewelry designer Anna Sheffield said the shift has been a main driver to her business's success. "People want something that is unique and specific to them," she said.
[...]
The price tag is also a big factor. "The guy paying for it is more excited that it costs less," said Michael Arnstein, president of the Natural Sapphire Company, which sells nearly 200 sapphire engagement rings a month. A round-shape 1.20 carat sapphire with 0.16 carats of diamonds on an 18-karat white gold ban sells for $3,500 on the company's website. "It's well agreed in the trade that a sapphire engagement ring will cost about half of what a comparable diamond would cost," he said.
Maybe a diamond isn't every girl's best friend.
More brides to be are choosing non-traditional engagement rings over the standard white diamond solitaire that has adorned women's left hands for so long.
Jewelers across the country are reporting an increase in couples looking for alternatives like colored diamonds, gemstones and bands to symbolize their commitment.
New York-based jewelry designer Anna Sheffield said the shift has been a main driver to her business's success. "People want something that is unique and specific to them," she said.
[...]
The price tag is also a big factor. "The guy paying for it is more excited that it costs less," said Michael Arnstein, president of the Natural Sapphire Company, which sells nearly 200 sapphire engagement rings a month. A round-shape 1.20 carat sapphire with 0.16 carats of diamonds on an 18-karat white gold ban sells for $3,500 on the company's website. "It's well agreed in the trade that a sapphire engagement ring will cost about half of what a comparable diamond would cost," he said.
- read the full article Diamond engagement rings are so over (from CNN)
