Buyers Guide for buying an Antique or Vintage jewelry

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    Shopping for an antique jewelry piece is not that easy, with new types of vintage reproduction jewelry pieces in the market it has become a challenge for the recent buyer to identify the original ones against the counterfeits. People have to keep their mind sharp and pay attention to the details when they shop for a vintage or an antique piece.  Before I talk any further, I find people confuse between the terms, an antique jewelry and a vintage jewelry. What’s the difference? Well an antique piece is any piece of jewelry that dates back more than 100 years and a vintage jewelry is something that is at least 20 years old.

Also there are different eras in jewelry

      Most often people have questions about the gemstones in their antique jewelry, is it real? Are they genuine? The answer to this gives a significant value to your jewelry piece. The best person to answer this question is a graduate gemologist. Genuine stones can be imitated easily, this practice is not something new, it dates back 13^th century when Egyptians made glass imitation, later during 17^th century people also discovered that adding a high percentage of lead to glass may increase the brilliance of the stone and creates beautiful imitations.

     Another aspect to look out for is the diamond cut. This type of cut could tell you the authenticity of the piece. The techniques in cutting these diamonds kept changing as technology evolved. The earlier old miner's cuts were the ones used during 1700’s, then later came the rose cut diamonds. Rose Cuts were hardly ever symmetrical and are usually found with rather irregular outlines. The oldest known Rose Cut is set in a pendant that is believed to be dated back 16th century. The final stage in the evolution of the Rose cut is the Full Rose cut or twenty-four-facet Rose Cut.

   Here I would like to share my experience, on another day my client who’s is in her 40’s came for a consultation in buying an antique piece from a famous local phoenix jeweler. She had bought in a necklace, bracelet and an earring. When I had a look at the pieces, i was surprised to see an 18 carat stamp on that and it was claimed to be an 1800’s aristocrat period jewelry.  People never used to stamp the jewelry those days. It also struck in my mind during 1800's they used rose cut diamonds which were never symmetrical or identical but the diamonds in these jewelry pieces were looking identical and full cut diamond. It didn't make sense, it cant be an antique piece. The seller has claimed that it was worth half a million whereas it’s actually worth only $80,000.

   Hence buying from a reputed jeweler doesn't mean that your jewelry is authentic, it’s always better to learn some things that you need to look out for when buying an antique jewelry and always consultant an expert before you buy one.

If you have any questions about buying an antique jewelry or diamonds please feel free to write to me at jacqueline@jnjewels.com.