To ask about your synthetic diamonds?

[blingybling]

NC in case this is outing!

My DP and I have spoken a lot about getting engaged soon (yay!) and I've started looking at rings. I've been engaged once before and had a very very beautiful big diamond ring, but the relationship was abusive and to be honest that ring just came to represent a whole lot of pain and sadness.

Since then I've read a lot about blood diamonds and the ridiculous economies behind them, and I don't want us to buy into that, plus we're in the middle of selling both our properties and buying together so I think it would be sensible to be as frugal as possible, though still keeping in mind I will want to wear this ring for the rest of my life.

So I've landed on the possibility of man-made diamonds, which seem like such a great ethical and budget-friendly option. I've been looking at 77diamonds and would love to hear your experience/thoughts/see photos of your ethical/frugal engagement rings

[quote Zilla1]@hilariousnamehere if corundum then wouldn't it be a white sapphire? Sapphires and rubies fabulous stones and I doubt many lay people could tell the difference between that and diamond by naked eye.[/quote]
Very possibly - I don't know much at all about them, just read the description on the listing I loved it on sight and it fit my budget far better than real diamonds I am now going to disappear down an internet rabbit hole about white sapphires which I didn't even know existed!

Diamonds really are such an incredibly successful con. It's amazing the way so many of us have absorbed the notion of "needing" a diamond for an engagement ring as if it were fact or more meaningful than anything else dreamt up by an advertising team.

Bit like white wedding dresses actually. Humans are so easily manipulated.

Unless you're buying up gold jewellery as a way to store gold, jewellery isn't an investment. Quite scary how many people think that.

@hilariousnamehere Good luck. I think sapphires are all shades of corundum except red which would then be a ruby. I mentioned it as a white sapphire might sound more pleasing to some than corundum, much like a diamond sounds more pleasant than an allotrope? of carbon. Happy surfing.

@TentTalk

I was very clear with DH when we were talking about getting engaged that I didn't want to buy in to the precious stones business. I'd have liked a silicone or wood & resin ring but DH is quite traditional and he went with a kinetique diamond. They've rebranded as Ethica Cornwall now. It's lovely.

We've now ordered from Ethica and the experience has been great so far - thanks so much for the recommendation!