Looking for a different, and perhaps shorter, series of cuts to try your hand at faceting? Arya Akhavan designed this cycle of nine diagrams that slowly build their complexity as you build your skills. The final design is an “exam” so you can evaluate how you are doing. He recommends skipping the first lesson if you are at all familiar with faceting, but we included it in the pdf so that you can choose whether you want to give it a go or not.

We also love this series as a compliment to Brown & Oros’ Twelve Stones. Not only do they work well together to form a 20-stone set of first cuts, but each cycle will familiarize a cutter with the different styles of two very talented and popular designers.

Akhavan’s designs are also available on the Gemology Project website, as individual PDFs and as Gem Cut Studio files. The latter are an excellent resource if you’re ready to jump into experimenting with modifying designs for specific stones, or even learning to create your own designs.