One Ring to Rule Them All: The perfect engagement ring revealed, as voted for by women in Grantham.

• 2/3 of women believe that men should not be allowed free rein when choosing the design.
• Over half of Brits believe that men should also wear engagement rings.
• The UK’s perfect engagement ring design revealed in CAD images

There are so many different rings to choose from out there, and not all women have the same taste! In order to offer some assistance to potentially baffled and bewildered blokes, heritage jewelers, William May, conducted a survey of 2,000 British women to find out what they would describe as the perfect engagement ring. Features they were able to choose from included the material of the band, the setting, the feature stone and the cut. 

Drum roll please…

British women overall described their dream engagement ring as having a white gold band (25.4%), with a round cut (27%) half-carat diamond (24.6%) in a solitaire setting (36.3%). 

Some of the other choices the women could pick from included platinum, yellow or rose gold bands; sapphires, rubies or opals; three-stone, vintage or halo settings; and oval, marquise or emerald cut stones. 

When broken down across the UK, the perfect engagement ring design changed styles slightly. Women in Grantham described their perfect engagement ring as having a white gold band (24.3%), with a round cut (25.9%) sapphire stone (26.6%) in a solitaire setting (34.7%). 

To help inspire those currently in the market for an engagement ring, but with no idea where to start, William May had the UK’s ‘perfect’ engagement ring designed using the latest Computer Aided Design (CAD) techniques and then rendered to photo-realistic quality:

Take note of the design gentlemen, as the survey found that British women know exactly what they want. Almost two thirds believe that men should not be allowed free rein when choosing the design. But don’t get down on one knee without the ring either – over one third (38%) of Brits say that when proposing, it is necessary to have the ring in hand. 

If you’ve already popped the question however, has your partner really confessed what they thought about your choice of ring? 54% of women admit that if they didn’t like the ring their partner chose, they would keep quiet and pretend they liked it! On top of this, almost a quarter (23%) of women admit they’ve lied to their friends about liking their ring when in fact, they didn’t! 

1 in 10 women say they would post a photo of their engagement ring online, so let’s hope you’ve made the right choice gents!

The survey also found that engagement rings aren’t exclusively to be worn by women: 52% of Brits believe that men should also wear engagement rings. 

Don’t always leave it up to the men to propose either ladies; time are changing and expectations around who should pop the question have too. William May found that 42% of women believe they should be equally responsible for getting down on one knee. And whilst proposals from women are more commonly associated with leap years, there are still another 11 months to go!

‘Proposals are joyous occasions for all parties involved,’ says a spokesperson of William May. ‘At least now those in doubt have some guidance when it comes to making the right decision for their significant other’.