An guest bent over in surprise after finding out the true value of her mum’s ring which she admittedly never liked.
The daytime series travelled to Northern Ireland to film an episode at the beautiful Castle Ward, where jewellery expert Susan Rumfitt met with a guest and her yellow ring.
“Well on this glorious sunny day, if not a bit breezy, we have sunshine in a box”, Susan began.
“This is a 1930s dress ring or perhaps even a cocktail ring. How did you get hold of this?”
The guest explained: “It was a relative of my mum’s, she lived in Philadelphia and when she died, a lot of her jewellery was sent to my mum, rings and brooches, and the rest we’ve been able to identify but we don’t know what this is.”
Antiques Roadshow guest in disbelief as mum’s ‘ugly hunk of glass’ ring gets top price tag. (Image: BBC)
An Antiques Roadshow guest brought in her mum’s 1930s art deco ring. (Image: BBC)
However, when Susan questioned if she liked the ring, she replied: “No. It is to me an ugly hunk of glass but I’m told it’s set in platinum and it has to be something so I don’t know but no, I don’t like it. I think it’s a bit too much for me.”
Susan commented: “Oh that’s a shame, it’s a gorgeous colour though, isn’t it? It’s a really pretty colour and if it’s glass, it’s a nice piece of glass.
“It is quite a lemon-y yellow as opposed to a bright, bright sunny yellow that you can get with some gemstones.
“But I know that you’ve spotted yourself that it’s set with diamonds and mounted in platinum so that kind of indicates it might not be a lump of glass really, doesn’t it? So it should be quite good news in many ways.”
Susan stated that it was a “very typical” style for the 1930s and that while the guest believed it was made of glass, she corrected her, adding that it was actually a yellow sapphire.
Antiques Roadshow expert Susan Rumfitt valued an art deco ring for at least £4,000. (Image: BBC)
The ring’s owner laughed: “Oh. Right, OK. I was thinking, best, citrine possibly, but right, it’s a sapphire.”
Susan replied: “I can understand why you might have thought it was a citrine, because with citrines you do get a similar sort of range of yellows from that light colour, all the way through to a punchy, intense yellow.
“Of course, the other thing it could have been is a yellow diamond. But it’s not, so we won’t get too excited.
“But it really is a great stone to have and a very hard stone, hence the reason why you’re getting that almost glassy look, because it’s the hardest gemstone after diamonds.
“So you can cut them really well and this emerald cut as we have here, just works so well with it and is just fantastic really. I did a quick measurement of it and it’s around about 16 carats which -”
The guest burst out laughing, interrupting Susan who then added: “ – so it’s all now building up quite nicely, isn’t it? So do you like it now?”
She then summarised: “It certainly brightened up my day and if this went into auction, you would be looking at an estimate between £4,000 and £5,000.”
The guest bent over in shock before saying: “You’re kidding me.
“That’s ridiculous, because when I was telling my mum I was coming here, she brought this out and I was like ‘I’m not taking that! That’s just a big lump of glass!’
“Obviously humiliated. And it is actually growing on me!”
Antiques Roadshow is available to watch on One and iPlayer.