Custom Diamond Art from Heartful Diamonds

I've done a lot of diamond art since I first discovered Diamond Dotz in 2017. I really enjoy it. The process is relaxing and the finished art is so sparkly and pretty. All of the early work I did with diamond art was with ready-made kits, then I started dreaming up projects to use up leftover diamonds (gems, dotz, drills... whatever you want to call them). I've customized pre-made kits more than once. The most fun I've had with diamond art was designing the projects for two diamond art books by Leisure Arts! 

On a whim, I decided to do something I've never done - order a custom diamond art kit. It turns out there are a zillion companies that do custom diamond art. I spent 5 minutes eliminating the sketchiest looking sites and settled on one that looked very promising, Heartful Diamonds. Without giving it any thought (or even reading through all the information on their website), I ordered a 12x12" square design with my travel logo. With shipping, it was about $30. It took about two weeks to arrive. 

At first glance, it was just what I expected. 

As I looked closer, there were a bunch of things I hadn't expected. Some were good. I love the fact that a company called Heartful Diamonds uses heart-shaped bubble wrap (affiliate link here and below).

The wax is heart-shaped too! And there are two pens in the kit, as well as multi-placer tips. I've seen those before but never tried them. Fun!

This chart is cool. It shows how many diamonds of each color there are in the kit. 

But... why are there SO many different colors? 

My logo, which I designed digitally, has seven colors. There's blue (globe), green (globe and pencil), pink (globe and pencil), tan (pencil), light grey (pencil), black (globe and pencil), and dark grey (top of globe base). 

With the white background, I should have eight sets of diamonds. Instead, there are 28. There are no shadows or color variations in the file I uploaded, so there should be no reason for 20 additional shades. 

Take a look at the text. It should be one color: black. I count 11 different colors in just the letter o. 

I know weird things happen when you try to convert certain shapes into pixels, but that much color variation for a single letter is crazy. Also crazy: this heart. It has three different shades. The bottom looks like a heart (sort of) but the top sure doesn't. I'll be tinkering with the text and the heart to make them look more like the way I want them. It should be a relatively easy fix.  

I was disappointed that the kit came with square diamonds. I prefer round for both their ease of application and their extra sparkle. But... it turns out that is 100% my fault. Remember how I said I ordered a 12x12" square design? It turns out I ordered a 12x12" design with square diamonds. It clearly says on the website that you can choose round or square diamonds. I was so focused on getting a square canvas that I didn't notice that I was actually selecting square diamonds! I love that they offer both. 

One more thing to mention is that the colors on the canvas aren't quite the same as the gems themselves. Not a big deal, since the canvas gets covered. Check out what's printed on the canvas vs. the diamonds themselves. 

Overall, I'm happy with my purchase and looking forward to getting started on my diamond art. 

Have you done a custom diamond art project? If so, what company did you use and how was the quality?