I wanted to talk about what we do best here at Samuelson’s Diamonds…buying and selling diamonds. We specialize in diamonds – round diamonds, emerald cuts, radiant cuts, princess cut diamonds and everything in between.  Unlike other jewelry stores selling diamonds, we hand pick each diamond that we sell, whether we bought from an individual, estate, or from a supplier.  One of my favorite things to do after buying a diamond is to study it and recut it to “Samuelson’s Diamonds Standards.”  A large number of diamonds we see are just not cut right, which is a very important to the fire and brilliance of a diamond.  I’m not talking about the the way some companies market “Ideal Cuts”.  You hear that everywhere, but who really knows what it means?  Sure it has a little to do with certain parameters like depth and table percentage, but we work very closely with our cutters to insure that our diamonds look just right to us and then to our customers.

Let me share an example with you.  Recently we bought a 2.62 emerald cut diamond from one of our customers.  It was beautiful color, the clarity was nice, but upon further inspection, we thought we could improve the clarity, cut and overall appearance.  This stone was already a VS1, but it had some tiny chips on the girdle and crown facets of the diamond.  So we took it to our master cutter and let him work his magic.  What was the windup?  We came out with a 2.57 D color (the highest diamond color grade given by the GIA) and VVS1 clarity. (the highest diamond clarity grade besides Flawless).  And we only lost five points.   So there you have an example where we sacrificed a small amount of weight loss for a higher clarity grade and better overall brilliance.  Take a look at a picture of this diamond with two matching .95 carat emerald cut diamonds on the side.

2.57 Center D VVS1 and matching sides

Sometimes, we take an even bigger weight loss to make the stone a different cut completely or even a different color!  Check out this video from a while back where we took an 8.57 off color round cut diamond and turned it into a 6.86 Fancy Yellow Radiant Cut diamond.  On that one we took about a 20% weight loss, but it was well worth it.  Some diamonds on the other hand are not worth recutting, as they won’t hold enough weight.  For example, it’s not always worth taking a loss on a 1.25 carat diamond, as the value will substantially decline once the stone goes below 1 carat, even if the diamond quality is a little better.   So it’s really just a simple optimization of having a bigger diamond, or a smaller diamond that is better quality.  And we always go with the option that will yield the highest ROI. (return on investment)

However, this stuff takes a lot of experience, patience and guts because once that diamond goes on the wheel, you are taking a chance.  Fortunately for us, we use the best and most respected diamond cutters in the world that make our diamonds not only the best diamonds in Baltimore, Washington or Virginia, but in the the best diamonds in the world!