I don’t own a lot of stuff for myself. Nor does hubby. Yes, we have a well stocked kitchen. Our children have a lot of equipment, toys, gifts, and sleeping aids. But actual gifts, luxurious things, things that we own just for the joy of having something nice… are very few and far in between. Neither my husband nor I do gifts. We eat out. We travel. But we haven’t really gifted each other for anniversaries, birthdays, Mother’s / Father’s days, or Valentine’s Day. We fell into this pattern long ago when we focused on other things. However, I did want a self gift for a long time.
This gift cost $6,500
All right, now that we got the cost out of the way, how did I approach buying this gift?
Rewind to 2018. I had gotten my biggest promotion at work to date. It came with significant increases in salary and total compensation, which, to this date, act as a benchmark for job prospects I have going forward. At that time I set a budget of $2,000 – $3,000 to buy myself a gift. I thought perhaps a wardrobe upgrade like a Burberry jacket.
2019, I thought instead, perhaps a luxury handbag. I’d been in Hong Kong by that time and had a very upsetting day where I felt absolutely inundated with luxury retail, and saw a handbag that I really wanted priced starting at $5,000 (Louis Vuitton Capucines). Then I got pregnant, I had my first kid, pandemic hit, all thoughts of shopping, really, went on the back burner.
2020, COVID. I wasn’t really shopping in person at all, and, I was a first time mom, went back to work late that year, and dealt with post partum depression. It’s a miracle I even functioned at all that year.
2021, I thought I’d get back to doing some research on this gift. I’d increased the budget to $5,000 at the time and thought about the Capucines. I was in Chicago and went to the Louis Vuitton store, but a good friend told me that the Capucines was a really heavy bag. And upon trying it again, I agreed. I also thought about the Bottega Veneta Cassette Bag which felt very classic. Finally, my eyes fell on the Reverse Monogram Trunk Clutch, which retailed for around $4,000 but I could find used later for around $2,800. I began setting up alerts on Fashionphile and The Real Real.
Then the handbag craze in my head fell to the wayside. In fact, from mid-2021 to mid-2022, I went and spent all in around $650 getting a number of handbags I liked from Italic (a discontinued handbag and wallet), Gianni Notaro (two handbags that I still use quite often), and Andrea Cardone Italia (a micro bag and a handbag). From this, I realized… I had enough. And, my tastes changed frequently enough that I can’t handle that with one designer bag alone, I’d want like 5 designs on rotation. Thus, I was more than happy with well crafted bags created direct in Italy without the designer premium. My desire for a designer handbag suddenly fell completely, it was as if my brain fog lifted. You can see most of my collection here (since this video, I’d sold or given away the Rebecca Minkoff and the Renee Leather Crossbody. I don’t use the Jole bag quite often as it’s still a bit large, and I broke the gift with purchase)
In late 2022, I decided I’d do a very classic diamond necklace. The reason was, outside of breastfeeding, I’d always wore a necklace every day and I wanted something special for special occasions. Once I have a jewelry piece I like, I almost never replace it (I had my original engagement ring restored, with a new stone because the old stone lost its lustre). I was inspired by walking around South Coast Plaza mall (a very high end mall in southern California, don’t recommend going there with your credit cards). At this time my engagement ring was still damaged from when I’d cut it off during my first pregnancy. I reached out to Bando Jewelry, a private jeweler I’d been introduced to in 2021 and who were the ones who got me a new wedding ring. They’re a mother-daughter minority owned business and I love supporting them. Along with the necklace below, they also repaired my engagement ring and put in a pink moissanite.
Here were my specs:
- A dazzling diamond tennis necklace, graduated in design
- A 3 prong design to show off the round diamonds
- VS clarity
- E/F color
- Nearly 15 carats of lab created diamonds. To me it wasn’t important that they were mined – a lab created diamond is chemically indistinguishable from a mined diamond, but lower cost
How did I know I got a great deal?
- For a branded necklace from a place like Tiffany’s, this necklace would cost $70K+ [Tiffany’s inspiration] Nothing wrong with Tiffany’s as a concept by the way (in the same vein, Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels, Harry Winston, etc.), you know you are getting high quality diamonds if you buy from them, and everyone knows you’re buying the brand, not the jewelry, and that’s the price you pay for it, same as if you were buying a designer handbag.
- For a non-branded, but mined diamond necklace from a mass retail store with vastly inferior colored diamonds, this necklace would cost ~$20K [comp: Jared – the diamonds are rated I for inclusion and I for color, yikes]
- For a lab diamond necklace from an online retailer, similar specs, this necklace would cost ~$10-15K [comp 1: Grown Brilliance, 17 ct, similar clarity and color] [comp 2: Brilliant Earth 17ct, worse clarity and color]
Going direct with a diamond district jeweler like Bando Jewelry was the clear winner. They meticulously handpick and matched the diamonds to get it to the perfect size and look. Getting VS clarity and E/F diamonds is about as good as it can get as well. D is nearly impossible and VVS / VVS2 are also very rare in terms of clarity.
The only caveat is that they take cash – like actual bills, so we decided on a secure place to meet on the day the necklace came in, which was near a bank, and quickly exchanged the goods then 🙂
Was the budget much larger than the original? Yes. I don’t regret it, as I know this is one of those items I will cherish for a very long time, and, I’d put in 5 years of thinking into it to ensure it was the right gift to myself.
