Tips and Tricks

Shh! The Secret of Hidden Halo Settings | Rare Carat

Secrets don’t make friends… unless it's a secret hidden diamond halo in your ring. What's better than a little surprise sparkle under your main stone? Well the answer is not much. A hidden halo is an amazingly glorious way to add a little extra without going over the top. Keep reading, there won't be any secrets left about hidden halo rings at the end!

hidden5.jpg

What is it?

A common halo is usually pave set (meaning the small diamonds placed close together) around the main center stone in the ring. A hidden halo is going to be the same idea, but underneath the girdle (under the prongs holding the main stone). This adds a great extra wow factor to your ring. It’s something you’ll want to show off no matter who they are, friends, family, the person behind you in the checkout line, who cares. It’s awesome and wonderful and just makes you smile when you see it. Why not show it off and share that happiness?

hidden6.jpg

Hidden vs obvious halo?

So why would you choose a hidden halo versus a classic, obvious halo? One reason is that you may have a bigger main stone that you don’t want to overpower by adding accent band or side stones. If you get a diamond that's large in its own right, you want it to be the life of the party and not get overpowered by other distracting accents. Or maybe, you just like more of a minimalistic look, but also like a little extra bling. A hidden halo will do just that for you.

hidden5.jpg

What's the best diamond cut for this?

To an unknown viewer, this will just look like a classic solitaire. It's what's under the hood (or technically… girdle?) that sets it apart. That's one of the greatest things about the hidden halo (and solitaires in general) is that whatever cut strikes your fancy, it'll look great. The hidden halo is perfect because it lets that main diamond, big or small, to have all the attention. That is until you unleash the secret and then it's just a beautiful combination of brilliance, simplicity, glitzy happiness for everyone involved.

hidden4.jpg

Color preference

A diamond will always dazzle and shine no matter what color gold it is set in. However, and this is a big personal preference, (if you can’t stand colored gold, go ahead and skip forward, won’t hurt my feelings) colored gold can really help the diamond to stand out. White gold and platinum - while stunning in their own right and beautiful for a setting - if you really want those hidden diamonds to pop, consider colored gold. It provides great contrast to a clear or white diamond, so its brilliance doesn’t get washed out in the similar toned setting. Especially when you have a hidden halo, where the diamonds are smaller and in a more inconspicuous area, rose or yellow gold will allow them to pop and show off their stuff. Here’s a little example for you. Take a look, see what you think.

Gold Colors.jpg

Are hidden halo settings more expensive?

When you take into consideration that the materials in the ring will be the gold and then loose diamonds, a hidden halo setting would technically be more expensive than a plain gold band. The jeweler will weigh all the band diamonds separately and give them what's called a total carat weight. So that's how you’ll know how much the accent stones weigh vs your center diamond. It will be more expensive than something plain, but it'll be worth it.

Hidden halo title pic.jpg

So there you have it reader- the secrets to hidden halo settings. While they aren’t super common, don’t you agree they should be? More sparkle with a surprise twist - and any diamond big or small looks great. No matter what, you can’t go wrong with the hidden halo.

Lex Alcala
Lex Alcala
Lex has been studying and diving into the gem world for years. She’s finally able to combine her love of writing and passion for all things gem and diamond related as a writer for Rare Carat. When she’s not working on on creating fun and fascinating articles or studying for her Graduate Gemologist Diploma, she’s hanging with her husband and 3 amazing bonus kids.