Tales from the Hood

Windy City Diamonds is known as an engagement ring store. At Windy City Diamonds we are also known for our ability to custom manufacture most any type of jewelry, yet sometimes we are surprized with the requests that we recieve in our store. Last week we had a man come in to our store, looking around, not for an engagement ring or a wedding band, but for something a bit more unusual. After a few minutes of searching, and not seeing what he was looking for, he approached one of the women on our sales staff and asked "Do you sell Hand cuffs?" She looked at him and said, excuse me? "Do you sell hand cuffs" he replied. I'm sorry sir, we generally carry engagement rings and wedding bands, but we don't carry hand cuffs here. Well, after hearing this conversation, some of the other staff began to smirk a little. I must say, I thought that our sales lady acted very professionally, but she too thought that this was a very odd request in a jewelry store. This client then asked to speak with the manager and was directed in the direction of another male sales associate in the store. He walked over and asked again if we sell hand cuffs?

After a bit of discussion between our salesman and our client, we realized that he wanted minature hand cuffs, designed to hold his pony tail, just like the one that Snoop Dogg has!! This conversation turned out to be quite funny, and we're now making hand cuffs for his hair!

We do have fun here, and we try to help with each and every request!!

Opal and Tourmaline, Octobers Birthstones

October has two traditional birthstones, the Opal, and Pink Tourmaline.
October’s traditional birthstone, the Opal, is thought to create hope, faith and confidence in its wearer. This beautifully radiant stone has been treasured and worn for centuries. In Elizabethan England, the opal was treasured both for their beauty and their presumed protective powers. The opal has been set into the crowns and necklaces worn by monarchs to ward off the evil spirits, to protect the eyesight, and even ground up and ingested to ward off nightmares!

Opals are famous for the “play of colors” that are seen in most opals. Many of these stones will flash different colors of the rainbow when moved. Red, Blue, White, Black, Yellow, Green, there is no end to the beauty of this spectacular stone.

Most opals are found in Australia, but there are deposits found in Brazil, Mexico, the Czech Republic, and even in Nevada. Opals may be worn in wide variety of jewelry including rings, pendants, bracelets and earrings. Opals reached their peak in popularity in the deco period of the 1920’s but their popularity has been waning in recent years and there has been a surge in purchasing the alternative birthstone for October, the beautiful Pink Tourmaline.

In Recent years, we at Windy City Diamonds have seen Pink Tourmaline gaining tremendously in popularity. Tourmaline has been prized for its association with balance, endurance and safety, and some people call it the “peace stone,” believing it to dispel fear and to make its wearer calm.

This beautiful example of Rubilite, a fine pink Tourmaline was custom designed by us at Windy City Diamonds, made in 18k White and 18k Rose gold to accent and enhance this gorgeous ring.

Tourmaline is found in a broad spectrum of colors and in the past has even been misidentified as Rubies, Emeralds and even Sapphires. In fact, there is a famous tourmaline, the size of a pigeon’s egg that belonged to the Russian Empress Catherine the Great, which was long thought to be a Ruby!

Windy City Diamonds has been making pink tourmaline jewelry for many years now and with the surge in pastel colors being worn today, this color blends beautifully to complete any outfit. As Tourmalines are a relatively hard gemstone, they will endure many years of enjoyment in your jewelry.

Sapphires - Septembers Birthstone

Sapphire is the birthstone for the month of September, and they are associated with the 5th, 23rd, and the 45th wedding anniversaries. I know this won't mean much to you, but they are 9.0 on the Mohs scale of hardness, 1 step below diamonds, making them the second hardest natural mineral.

Once upon a time, sapphires were believed to have great healing powers that would help the wearer with rheumatism, colic and even mental illness. Sapphires have also been associated with great wealth and many Hollywood royalty have been seen sporting Sapphire jewelry.

Joan Crawford received a 70 carat star sapphire ring from her second husband. When Richard Burton proposed to Elizabeth Taylor for the second time, he too presented her with a cabochon sapphire ring.

Lady Diana Spenser's engagement ring from Prince Charles was an 18 carat, deep blue, oval sapphire surrounded by 14 round brilliant cut diamonds. This same ring, as many of already know, was presented to Kate Middleton, now known as Princess Katherine, from Prince William.

Medium to Dark Blue is the most associated color for this birthstone, but if you were lucky enough to be born in the month of September, you may pick from any color in the sapphire family for your jewelry. Your choices may include blue, yellow, pink, green, brown, purple, white, orange or colorless, and there is even a rare variety known as color-change sapphire that shows different colors under different lighting conditionsSapphires in any color are a versatile stone that may be set into most any type of jewelry for your enjoyment.

At Windy City Diamonds, we have custom manufactured many styles of jewelry that have incorporated Sapphires. Sapphires are beautiful on their own, but when accented with diamonds, the excitement intesifies with these precious stones.

Here is an example of a spectacular 5.00 carat, cushion cut sapphire diamond ring that we made for one of our clients.

Again surrounded by beautiful round brilliant cut diamonds, this made a breath taking diamond and sapphire engagement ring. This is one lucky lady!
Best of all, sapphires are easy to care for, requiring no special treatment for cleaning.

Sustainable Weddings

This past weekend I had the pleasure of attending my Niece's wedding. My niece and her husband are extremely environmentally conscience, and they wanted to see how "green" friendly they could manage with their wedding, leaving as small a foot print as possible.

The first thing that they did was to use Vimeo to create an e-video for their save the date. Of course this was then disseminated to their friends and family via email, leaving no environmental footprint in their path, and they saved money as well. No paper, no printing, no postage.

Now comes the invitations. Again, turning to the internet, they produced a beautiful e-vite, along with a "response card" to maintain their goal of being completely sustainable in their approach. The invitations were beautiful, and I've found that there are a multitude of sites on the web that may be used for sending out these invitations via email, some free, some for a small fee, but this too saves on paper and postage, leaving no footprint.

I wondered how they were going to maintain this lofty goal of zero impact on the environment with their actual wedding, which did turn out to be a bit harder, but still, I was amazed at the extent to which they worked this out.

The arrived and left their wedding on bicycle, no pollution, no impact.
The wedding dress was made in a fashion that it could later be dyed and hemmed to wear in the future. This has a small impact on the environment, but no more than any other clothing that you would purchase normally.

The food that was served was all vegetarian, and delicious, but this didn't impress me as being sustainable, until I found out that all of the produce was grown locally, only organic produce, much of it by the chef him self, and used in preparation of all of the meals. No shipping, cartage, etc, no fuel used to transport, just good quality, organic (no pesticide) vegetables. They even served fruit smoothies made with locally grown organic apples. What a wonderful idea!!

The Flowers were all locally grown, in season flowers, which were beautiful, and again kept the environment footprint very small. In addition to this, the vases that were used were ball jars that will be re-used again and again as my niece loves to make canned fruits and vegetables.

Ok, so I guess you’re wondering how we can bring the jewelry into the idea of sustainability. Easy, the rings that were used were family heirlooms, re-worked to fit their taste!!

All in all, this was quite an impressive wedding and quite an impressive feat to accomplish such a small environmental footprint with 150 people at the wedding!

Our Friends from all walks of LIfe

It's truly a pleasure working with our friends and clients. We have clients from all walks of life and sometimes we are fortunate, and our friends share pictures of their special day, their wedding day with us. I would like to share one of these pictures with you today.

In some cultures, it is customary to have "Henna" parties. The bride and her bridal party will paint their hands with a temporary dye called henna, and often in very intricate patterns. I loved seeing the juxtaposition of the two hands, together with the traditional hand painting and the wedding bands that they chose to express their love and devotion to one another.

I thank them for sharing, and I hope that you too enjoy seeing how some of us have different traditions, that blend so beautifully with today's modern bride.

Wow!! What a wonderful engagment story

I recently received this wonderful email from a client of mine, months after I had worked with him, and I had to share it with everyone. One of the reasons that I love my job is that I have wonderful friends and clients, that appreciate the effort that we put into each and every piece of jewelry that we make, and everyone leaves happy!
___________________________________________________________

I'm sorry for the delay. This email is long overdue.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

I was in your shop on a rainy, cold February 26th. I took care of everything engagement-related that day: asked her father (a cop) if I could marry his daughter around 8a, had a wonderful ring shopping experience at Windy City Diamonds from 10a-1p, and asked her to marry me around 7p.

Here's how it went down:

She had to take care of her grandpa till about 5:30p, planning to get home around 6p. We had a dinner party to go to that night around 7p, so I planned on asking her beforehand. I got to her place about 5:45p. From the time I left my house, I was so nervous! As I sat on her living room couch waiting for her to get home, my heart was racing so fast. I was amazed at how something like this could make my body react in such a way. I set up a camera in a hidden location, and stuck the ring in my pocket. When I heard the garage door open, I nearly jumped with excitement. I turned the camera on, and sat back down, pretending to read a magazine. She came through the door, coat on, and water bottle in hand. I was so nervous and excited that I basically ran right at her, haha (She later said that she noticed how I sprinted to her so fast).

We hugged and kissed and all that good stuff. Then, I went into "remember when?" mode:

me (trying to cover up a shaky voice): "I was thinking today how we're going to Lindsay's for dinner tonight, just like the first night we kissed years ago."
her: "yeah.."
me: "Remember when I went in for the kill, you stopped me and said, 'before we do this, you know how crazy my life is, and how crazy my family is?'"
her: "haha, yeah"
me: "Well, after all this time, all I know is that I'm crazy about you."
her: "I'm crazy about you too!"
me: "and now I wanna know (dropping to one knee, displaying the ring), do you wanna get a little more crazy?"
her: *gasp* "HOLY CRAP!"
me: "Jamie, will you marry me?"
her: *shocked* *2 seconds = eternity*
me: "(um), will you marry me?"
her: "yes! YES!!!!!"

I looked down at the ring and noticed that I had the center stone shifted off to the right, so I made a quick adjustment, haha. We embraced for a long time, called a bunch of family and friends, and finally went to our party. It was great! I'm glad I didn't wait.

__________________________________________________________
I'm fortunate that he came in, and I'm very happy that he took the time to share his story with me, which is why I felt compelled to share with you all as well. Enjoy your day!

How much should you spend on an Engagement Ring?

This summer, it’s estimated that more than 500,000 men in the United States will pop “the question”, which means that summer time is engagement ring time.

Many men will be wondering, how much should they save for an engagement ring? Traditionally, DeBeers Diamond Company suggested that a groom should plan on spending at least three months’ of his annual salary. Yet the question remains, how valid is this ideal of spending three month’s salary given the difficulties in the world economies today and closer to home, our still sluggish economy?

At a time when the unemployment rate is close to double digits and the household savings rate is in single digits, not everyone will feel comfortable spending 25 percent of their annual income on a ring.

Still, there is the ideal that 3 months salary is the target, but there are a few things to remember when making this decision. First, it’s not like an automobile that you will drive for a few years and then trade or sell for a newer model, nor is it even like a condominium or home that you may decide to sell and move for what ever personal reasons that you may have.

This is a purchase that will last a very long time, and will be enjoyed for a very long time. My wife still gets compliments on her engagement ring, and she has worn it every day since the day she put it on her finger, 34 years ago!! Remarkably, this is not an unusual response that I often hear from our friends and clients about their rings as well.

My personal opinion is that this is a purchase that is recognizing your stated love between two people and should be one of the happiest events/moments in your life. It should not be uncomfortable, or so stressful that you’re worried about how much you are spending on this ring; rather it should be purchased within your comfort zone, after setting your own personal goals as to what is important to you about this purchase. Believe me; she’s going to love what you do!!