Buying diamond is like choosing wife. Degem brand are expensive hence you cannot compare to different category. Lazare can compare with forevermark

Before I bought a proposal ring I was considering Forevermark and WahChan. I decided to go with Wah Chan 0.6,F,VS2,3EX,Non-Flourescent, GIA. 9k. Reason is I don't expect my wife to wear solitaire daily.

Lazard and Forevermark is 25% more for same spec. Regardless how much sparkle you see with your eye, do consider the ring too. Once the diamond is set, it will block some light hence reducing the sparkle.

With the money saved I spend on Cartier Trinity Wedding band which we use daily.

Unless you have extra cash then both wedding band and proposal ring can be branded.

Cartier Love 4mm, rm4900 (each)
Cartier TRINITY Classic, rm4700 (each)

Price for your reference. FYI, Yearly increase of 10% (Malaysia) is coming in March 2014. Get it before March.
Initially i wanted to buy it from Cartier Tokyo during my Japan trip, but price revised 10% up in 17 Jan 14. I was there in Feb....sigh....

I got 2 choice.
Degem forevermark 0.28c F SI1 Rm 26xx or
Love n co lovemark 0.23 H vs2 Rm 30xx
I like the love n co ring design which is more fashion. Forevermark ring is more classic.

SK TruLove  VS1 G 0.35 IGI 5700 --> setting I wanted
SK TruLove  VS1 E 0.31 IGI 5622 --> not the setting I wanted.. need to reset... Should I go for the bigger, the setting I liked but lousier color grade?

Lazare is slightly better than Forevermark imo (though not by much), just go the DeGem Bangsar and check it out.

I think overall, Estrella was the best bang for the buck. The others, which cheaper, pale in comparison to the Estrella, Forevermark or Lazare. I went to Wah Chan and at first, the sales person tried to tell me their stone was great but after speaking to them in detail, he admitted that we can't really compare theirs to the likes of Lazare.

If you want to find out what are the differences in the cut, just ask them to show you their certificate and go use a tool like the HCA (http://www.pricescope.com/tools/hca) or the AGS (http://www.pricescope.com/tools/AGA_NAJA_Cut_Class_Grader) to gauge roughly what kind of 'shine' you can expect.

Lazare is expensive because it sits really high up the Cut scale, and all of their stones are cut to that measurement while GIA or AGS is just a grading agency, you can find great stones if you know what you are looking for.

I'd say go take a look for yourself, I didn't thought much about diamond and its differences until you look at it. Some will see it, some will not. Some cares for it, some do not. Just go look at as many as possible and pick the one you find best.

Habib's Hearts on Fire is freakin ex-pen-siveeee ... But it's nice, I can't deny that..

Just to clarify, you can find Lazare's cut in other places (because its basically just angles and measurements), the advantage with Lazare is that all of their stones is within that allowed range, so it saves you time wondering / guessing.

If you have access to the GIA /AGS certs, you can plug those figure in and you might find one as good, if not better than Lazare's cut.

If you are interested in Lazare, go to the Bangsar branch and find Alex, tell him Jimmy recommended  you