The pictures here (mine and I apologize for the quality) are of a ring I just completed for a customer. I broke all of my own rules on it. First of all, I'm not a big fan of marquis shaped diamonds (which used to be called navette shaped for you history buffs out there)but I do routinely have customers come in who own them and want me to do something different with them and I'm always happy to accomodate them. In this case she was looking for something fairly streamlined and geometric, but she had also seen an ad for some pendants that had marquis stones (not diamonds) set with only two prongs holding them in and she wanted the end prongs to actually come out of the band itself, or perhaps a better way of saying it is that she wanted them to actually be created from the band. Of course I went into a long discourse on why there shouldn't be only two prongs. It's not enough protection against loss, leaves the diamonds more subject to breakage, etc.
However, sometimes when I actually get into making a piece up, I realize things are going to be different than I thought. After I got the seat and the general shaping of the band together I realized that four prongs on the side were going to take away from the streamlined simplicity of the band. I also realized that the band was so incredibly chunky to begin with that if I could actually make prongs out of it to hold the dismond, they would be so substantial that security in the setting wasn't an issue. Also because of the way I built the seat for the stone, even though the sides were exposed, they weren't hanging out in the middle of open air to be whacked anytime the customer moved her hand.
So I made an executive decision to leave them off and finish up the ring with only the two prongs. It took me close to 2 hours to set the stone (usually I can do a stone setting in about 10 minutes) because I had to hammer set (use a hammer and chisel to push the metal down onto the stone) the stone in place, something that with a marquis with long pointy ends that are just dying to break off when you look at them crosseyed, is extremely dangerous. But both the stone, and my now sweaty self, managed to survive intact and I think the ring came out quite nicely. It's not one of my usually more detailed pieces, but I think it came out pretty cool looking and the customer seemed thrilled.
However, sometimes when I actually get into making a piece up, I realize things are going to be different than I thought. After I got the seat and the general shaping of the band together I realized that four prongs on the side were going to take away from the streamlined simplicity of the band. I also realized that the band was so incredibly chunky to begin with that if I could actually make prongs out of it to hold the dismond, they would be so substantial that security in the setting wasn't an issue. Also because of the way I built the seat for the stone, even though the sides were exposed, they weren't hanging out in the middle of open air to be whacked anytime the customer moved her hand.
So I made an executive decision to leave them off and finish up the ring with only the two prongs. It took me close to 2 hours to set the stone (usually I can do a stone setting in about 10 minutes) because I had to hammer set (use a hammer and chisel to push the metal down onto the stone) the stone in place, something that with a marquis with long pointy ends that are just dying to break off when you look at them crosseyed, is extremely dangerous. But both the stone, and my now sweaty self, managed to survive intact and I think the ring came out quite nicely. It's not one of my usually more detailed pieces, but I think it came out pretty cool looking and the customer seemed thrilled.
My pt assistant Jason cleaned up my pictures a bit and so they're not quite so bad. My apologies for the red wax showing though.
Daniel, I can't stop staring at my new ring. Ladies, blow up the picture to get a closer view. Thanks again Daniel.
ReplyDeleteSincerely,
Evelyn