The difference between Pave and Bead Set rings

People confused “paving” with “bead set” all the time. There’s a reason for that. Let me make a vital point from the beginning of the answer. You may not have thought of this part. Manufacturers spend time designing and working on the details of each and every piece of jewelry they produce. In almost all cases, the manufacturer owns the copyright to the design. Copyrights are legal protection against another company making “knockoffs” or duplicates of your work and selling the duplicates.

The confusion is in the words used. “Bead setting” is a particular way of setting stones in metal. Pave is more of a stone set design and bead setting is the technique for placing stones in a pave pattern.

Bead setting is the technique. Pave is the pattern. A one-man ring may have a stone set in the center. The stone is mounted with beads, but the work is not paved. Think of paving as you would on a cobblestone or brick-after-brick street, literally paved with bricks. In paving the idea is to “pave” the surface with stones … that is paving. Bead setting is the method of holding the stones in place.

The ring may or may not be set with beads. And this is not paving. Pave in the strict sense covers an expanded area and not just a row of stones. It does not matter. The name doesn’t really matter if this ring is the look you want. I suspect the setting is molded with raised spike shaped parts to make setting easier than actual bead setting.

That is fine when done correctly and is better than reckoning if reckoning is done in the best way. Adjusting the drawstring can provide the same look, but it is more time consuming to do it correctly.

In bead setting, a sharp chisel-like tool called a graver is used to set the stones. First, a seat or hole for the stone is cut into the metal. Then the grave is pushed down into the metal to the outside of the stone. The tip of the mortar causes the metal to move towards the stone. This process is repeated until all of the stone is secure with enough metal over the “corners” to hold it securely.

Then a tool with a rounded hollow end called a beading tool is pressed onto the metal that is pressed onto the stone. The beading tool turns the metal shape into an attractive looking metal “bead”. Now you can see where the term “account set” originates.

Now here’s a question to ponder. How can you make the ring at a lower cost to you than the one already made? Considering the prices we must charge to make molds, casts and set stones for a single item, the price would be at least if not more than that originally offered by the manufacturer. We do not make copies of copyrighted designs, but we do enough custom fabrication to know our actual costs of making a single ring or other jewelry item.

The only way I see that the ring is less expensive if the jeweler makes it is by using lower quality stones, perhaps fewer stones or fewer karats of gold. The ready-made ring can also be of a much less favorable build quality than the original ring, a means of reducing costs. If we were to try to duplicate the ring you showed, using 14k instead of the used 19k, our customer price for equal or better technical quality would be even higher than some of the other manufacturers’ rings.

The labor to make a single ring is the reason and stone setting costs incurred. Our jewelers do all the work and we do not have specialized people who only make stone settings as large manufacturers do.

Tip: Look closely at the rings or jewelry made by the jeweler with whom you have consulted. How well done is the job? Is everything neat and clean in sight? Ask about the quality of the stone, etc. Do you want a product as fine as the original or one step lower, or better? These are thoughts to seriously consider. I tell it as I see it; that’s fair to you.

I don’t want to scare you about copyright. Maybe this will help. Directly copying someone else’s design is copyright infringement. Choosing a “similar style” is generally not a violation. For example, many jewelry manufacturers make rings with stones placed side by side along a row on a women’s ring. A ring with stones set like this and with decorative sides made by your jeweler but not a direct copy should not be a copyright issue.

A ready-to-use stone row mount (stone stripped) may be available that will be perfectly fine for you. This is an option that I didn’t mention at the beginning. If you can find a ready-made mount with the look you want, the job is likely to be less expensive than having a ring made from scratch.