The Top Drawer

Perhaps no other jewelry you purchase will have greater sentimental value and be worn more often than your engagement and wedding rings. As timeless symbols of your love and commitment to one another, it’s only natural that you want to take the utmost greatest care of them.

1) Protection: Be gentle to your rings – It is advised to remove your rings before potentially undertaking any heavy work, gardening or dealing with harsh chemicals. Despite being incredibly strong, gemstones and even diamonds can chip or crack if accidentally struck too hard.

2) Upkeep: Keep your rings scratch free – All precious metals will eventually get scratched over time and can be brought to any professional jeweler to be buffed and polished. If your rings are made of white gold, your jeweler may also suggest that they be re-plated. This is normal as white gold is an alloy with a yellow gold base; it gets its white color from being plated in rhodium. After being buffed, the ring may begin returning to its natural gold color. If you’ve purchased platinum wedding bands, they can be polished back to their original condition. Platinum is naturally white, so no upkeep is needed to retain its luster.

3) Inspection: Watch out for loose diamonds – For peace of mind, have your jeweler occasionally inspect her engagement ring to ensure the stones are securely in place. It’s not uncommon for diamonds to come loose with everyday wear and tear. We generally recommend an annual inspection. However, depending on her lifestyle and the ring’s metal type, this may need to be done more or less frequently. Because of its density, a platinum setting will hold stones most securely in place.

4) Cleaning: Let those diamonds sparkle – The maximum brilliance of her diamonds can be maintained by keeping the ring clean. This can easily be done by soaking the ring in a mild solution of soap and warm water or a jewelry cleaning solution and gently rubbing dry with a soft cloth. Do not do perform this near a sink as you may risk the ring falling down the drain! For a more thorough cleansing, take the wedding and engagement ring to your jeweler.

5) Storage: Keep your rings safe – Store your pieces in a jewelry box, individually lined compartment or chamois bag when not being worn. Ensure that they are carefully placed separately to avoid the diamonds from rubbing against other pieces of jewelery which may produce a scratch.

At one point, gold wedding rings were the option. But recently platinum has grown tremendous in popularity. Platinum is more precious than gold, and has other advantages over gold as well.
Platinum wedding rings are elegant.  Platinum was often mixed with gold, but today you can find wedding rings of pure platinum. Polished platinum sparkles as much as gold.  Platinum is a durable metal, and your active lifestyle will not get in the way of wearing a platinum ring.

Given that platinum wedding rings have a very modern look, the best styles are elegant, but simple.  A “comfort fit” is curved slightly in the inside, and most men find them a good choice since a ring is worn more then anything else that adorns the body.  Platinum is heavier than gold which is often the main reason men choose them over gold.  Remember that many men love Swiss sports watches for the same “weighty” reason.
You will pay a premium for platinum.  One reason some buyers go with gold is they are concerned they will lose their ring, and want to be able to replace it less expensively.  Do keep in mind that an engagement ring is not like a set of car keys.  You will grow to love it more and more with each passing year, as you do your partner, and will have a magnetic connection to it.  That may mean that IF you take it off, you will have a brilliant system for making sure your ring is never lost.

Antique Styles
For people who are not fortunate enough to have heirloom engagement rings in their family, pieces that are handmade using styles from generations past also provide historic  reverence.  A vintage ring is sometimes made with filigree designs, highlighting a period’s characteristics (Edwardian, for example), and have attention to detail that one would find more often when these styles were contemporary.

Bezel Settings
A lipped metallic ring keeps a diamond safely in place on bezel rings and make sense for women that are on the go.  An added bonus is that the setting makes  the stone look larger, while also holding it firmly in place.

Engagement & Wedding ring combination
Often these rings have many small diamonds which sparkle brightly around a platinum or gold band.  With the emphasis on more stones, they are higher on glitter and lower on cost than the traditional separate engagement ring with a large stone.

Personalized Engravings
This can be as simple as the date of a wedding or as detailed as a phrase from a song or poem.  If you intend to have a ring engraved by hand, do so weeks in advance.

Colored Diamonds
We’ve mentioned before on The Top Shelf that color is very in with all types of jewelry this year.  Expect to pay a significant premium on colored diamonds due to their scarcity.  These are favorites with celebrities.

Do not give a “secondhand” engagement ring to someone! If it was a family heirloom that’s different of course. If you’ve given that heirloom to numerous wives from numerous prior marriages, and your soon to be fiancé will probably guess that, think twice. Engagement rings have far more meaning to most women than wedding rings. Remember that, as girls, diamond rings stand along-side princes in storybooks and represent all that is love.

No one wants to think about the history a ring had on the finger of a former fiancé or wife.

Educate yourself about ring styles and fashion on at least a simple level. “American consumers favor the largest rocks possible, as demonstrated by Hollywood starlets,” Ruth Donaldson, the UK manager of Platinum Guild International says. “British consumers are still living up to their more austere reputation. Ladies like a better class of diamond and lean towards the best metals being used to secure their jewels. It is strongly felt by brides that their fiancés are getting it wrong if they are just selecting the biggest rock.”

Heirloom style rings are always well liked, but the intensity of their popularity is new this spring . These rings typically have intricate metal settings with diamond detailing. We’ve seen a big spike in their sales, and this is also reported industry wide. Color engagement rings are hot, with gemstones such as sapphires, rubies, and beryls being the most popular. Amethyst and peridot are popular with all types of jewelry and match well with the colors of spring clothing.

Diamonds shine particularly strong this spring. The right diamond draws character from its environment. The style now is to have large quantities of diamonds in rings to create a potent sparkle. The added quantity also serves to boost the size of the center stone, or, at a minimum, make it look larger.