Princess
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Princess
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The Princess Cut Diaries (How to select the most beautiful Princess Cuts)
For those of you who have spent time browsing the diamonds we feature you'll know that we just don't post or purchase for inventory the common types of stones that are sold in most stores or websites. Our aim is to select the most aesthetically beautiful stones utilizing the latest and best technologies for the task as we can ascertain and separate the most brilliant princess cuts from the least. The #1 question we get asked most frequently is ... "What proportions constitute an "Ideal" princess cut? Thankfully AGS has undertaken the task and very recently (as of May 1st 2005) starting issuing lab reports on princess cuts and have designated an "ideal" grade which is very hard to attain. Most factories cutting princess cuts do not send their goods to AGS for the most part so those that have the gumption to do so must be very confident in what they are cutting. We'll see how this plays out. While the expression "Ideal" just started being applied to certain princess cuts (only from AGS) this tutorial is being written during a major transition that is taking place within our trade. Both GIA and AGS Labs are completely revamping their cut grading systems and AGS' first implementation with this new cut grading system will, of all shapes, be applied firstly to princess cuts (effective May 1st 2005). When this system is released we will be updating this tutorial as necessary and comparing the results of their studies with that of our own. So far, the limited information that has been given to us from AGS shows a nice correlation between what we have found and what they have found. At this point it appears that we are very much on the same page. We'll be breaking down this tutorial into a number of chapters. The first 2 which are included on this page. In the upcoming weeks we'll be adding the others.
Where to begin? Well ... lets start with the current market situation. Since there is currently no standard definition for what constitutes "ideal" for princess cuts, cutting houses are generally guided by one philosophy which dominates throughout most cutting houses. Get the most yielded weight from the rough as possible with little or minimum regards for proportions that will produce high brilliance. The result? Generally stones with total depths or tables that are in the high 70's to low 80% range resulting in either bottom heavy or top heavy stones with shallow crowns. Either of which produce brilliance and light return that 99% of the time is less than ideal. :( A current search from one of our wholesale databases produces the following results...
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