We buy your diamonds

Selling a ring is rarely just a transaction. Divorce, a death in the family, a marriage that ended quietly years ago — we have sat across from all of it, and the conversation stays as short or as long as you want it to be. Nobody here asks why.

Mounted stones are valued in two parts. The diamond is graded on its own merits, and the setting is assessed separately: platinum and gold carry metal value, and a signed mount from Tiffany, Cartier or Van Cleef is worth considerably more than the sum of its materials. Splitting the two out is how you see whether the offer makes sense.

Older cuts deserve a word. European and mine cuts, common in pieces from before the 1930s, are graded on a different scale than modern brilliants and have their own collector market. Judged as if they were modern stones they look poor; judged correctly they often surprise people.