written by Jessica
Explaining Engagement Ring Setting Styles & Engagement Ring Parts
POV. Your ring journey is about to begin. There are SO many styles and you are getting intimidated. You have an abundance of saved pins on your Pinterest of potential designs. You don’t know where to begin.
We feel you, we got you. Sometimes it’s just about translating what you’ve been imagining into the right words. Let’s get you equipped with 3 simple tools to communicate your ring idea.
TOOL #1. USE THE THREE MAIN VIEWS
You will be referencing the three views of the ring a LOT as you describe your idea.
Top Down View
Here we can focus on the prongs and the center stone.
Let’s use the oval stone as an example. The classical setting style would be to have the length at the north/south orientation (think of a compass!) but some of our clients like to have an east/west orientation so that the stone is set horizontally.
Horizontally set oval center stone (length at east/west orientation)
Vertically set oval stone (length at north/south orientation)
You may have a preference on the location of where the claws will be.
You could say something like: “Okay so looking at the top down view, I love the stone but I prefer the claws to be at the north east south west points.”
Or something like “At the top down angle, I would like the band to taper toward the center of the stone”
Profile View
Here we can talk about the details of the way the stone is set. There’s the basket, the shoulders, even little details underneath the shoulders (look at those stars underneath!).
Side View
You might say “I would like stones going down halfway, and where the stones end I would like hand engraving from there going all the way down to the bottom.”
TOOL #2. WIDTH VS THICKNESS
Had to sneak that in here 😉
Width vs thickness has been a common source of confusion in ring terminology. Lets clear this up.
WIDTH is defined by the side profile view.
Using width to describe your ring could sound like, “for width, I’d like it to be wider at this point, thinner toward the center stone”
THICKNESS is defined by the profile view. Think of it as the distance from the inside ring to the outside ring.
You might say: “I’d like the thickness of the band to be the thickest at this part of the ring, and I want it to get thinner toward the bottom”
TOOL #3. REFER TO YOUR RING AS A CLOCK
The embellishes and details on your ring is where you can get really playful and creative. Or maybe you want to add a not so obvious gemstone signifying your partner. The best way to place these designs with accuracy is to refer to the ring as a clock.
Let’s say we want a “peek-a-boo” gemstone at three o’clock and nine o’clock. This gives us a super specific direction that we can take to everyone on production and all the jewelers on the bench.
Here’s an example of a detail at 11 o’clock.
This is an accurate and simple tool to ensure we get not only what you want, but in its perfect place.
