Jewelry Mounting, Gold Percentage and Gold Color

 

FAQs:

 

  • What are rings made of?
  • What is “18K”?
  • How is it different from 90% gold?
  • Is the white accessory body made of silver?
  • Is this white gold or plated?
  • etc.

To answer all of these questions, I will explain as follows:

1.Gold Percentage

 

Most of fine diamond jewelries are often made with solid gold mounting. And most mountings are made of gold at some certain purity % depending on market preferences. There are for example 75% is 18K (the most common), 90% and 96.5% gold (found in Thailand only).

2.Metal color

 

Jewelry mounting at any purity % (except 99.99% purity) can be made in colors by 2 methods: 1.plating and  2. mixing with colored alloy.

Plating: is a technique that use chemicals to cover the surface of jewelry mounting into a specific color. The most common color is white gold, yellow gold and rose gold. This method doesn’t give a long-lasting result as the color wears off easily, especially if the jewelry that is worn every day.

Alloy mixing: is giving a better result and more natural look on the mounting surface. Each jeweler has his own recipe to mix the alloy and make gold color.

This is all to say that you cannot tell the % of gold by just looking at the color of mounting, and vice versa. And now I will tell you how can we tell what that jewelry piece is made of, and if the color is plated or not.

There are 4 easy ways to do:

 

    1. Ask your jeweler directly
    2. See the details of the piece on jewelry certificate
    3. Look for a metal stamp on the jewelry piece
    4. Check the % with a special machine

The reason why you need to know is simply because you need to know what you pay for. And also each has different way to maintain.

For plating jewelry, you need to replate it if the color wears off (usually once a year). For the jewelry that is not colored plate, you only need to get a simple cleaning or shining service from your jeweler or you can simply just clean it yourself at home.

Written by
Sornsida Y. Chanonprapa (G.D. GIA 2015)
Diamond Nerd จากสถาบัน GIA ศึกษาเรียนรู้ หัด grading เพชรมาโดยเฉพาะ บวกกับพื้นฐานเป็นลูกช่างทอง มีประสบการณ์ทำงานใน Field จิวเวลรี่มากว่า 20ปี จึงอยากใช้พื้นที่นี้แบ่งปันความรู้และประสบการณ์กับทุกคนค่ะ