Everything You Need to Know About Metal

Everything You Need to Know about Metal

Copper has been worn throughout history because of its believed abilities to heal arthritis, aid in blood circulation, and reduce inflammation. When copper tarnishes it takes on a beautiful antique green patina. Sweat and skin oils from your skin often oxidize with copper jewelry and create a green layer on your skin.

Brass is used for many purposes because of its beautiful, warm yellow color- the most affordable option compared to gold. Brass also oxidizes when mixed with sweat and skin oils, turning your skin green. When brass tarnishes it creates a dark antique patina but can be easily cleaned with lemon juice to return to a desired bright yellow color.

Nickel is a common metal used in alloys to decrease the jewelry's ability to bend and scratch. Nickel allergies are quite common so always look for nickel free metal if you have a known allergy.

Precious Metals: Silver, Gold- Filled, Gold

Sterling silver is an alloy of 92.5% silver and 7.5% copper. Copper is added to silver to increase its strength, however the copper causes sterling silver to tarnish over time. The tarnish will turn the white-ish original color of silver to a darker patina.

PMC silver is made with 99.9% recycled fine silver. The higher percentage of silver in this metal makes it more resistant to tarnishing than sterling silver. Gold-filled metal consists of 14k gold mechanically bonded with a brass core (the gold makes up 5% of the metal). A more affordable option to gold, gold-fill is tarnish resistant, typically hypoallergenic, and will not oxidize with the skin. Gold fill jewelry will inevitably tarnish over many years.

24k gold is pure gold and tarnish resistant. A lower karat means the gold is combined with another metal- copper, nickel, silver, or zinc- to increase its hardness and affordability. The lower the karat, the lower percentage of gold. Rose gold is yellow gold combined with copper to achieve a redish, pink color. White gold is often yellow gold plated with rhodium to reflect a white-ish silver color.

Gold Plating vs. Vermeil

Gold plating is often done by applying a thin film of gold to a base metal underneath (the gold makes up 1% of the total metal). Often, gold plated jewelry is very affordable especially if the layer of gold is ultra-thin. The thinner the coating, the quicker the gold will wear off revealing the base metal underneath. Depending on what the base metal is, the worn jewelry may have a different reaction with your skin, turning it green or creating an allergic reaction.

Vermeil is a French technique for gold plating in which silver is plated with a much thicker coating of gold. Vermeil is a much higher quality option to gold plating, due to the thicker plating of gold increasing the lifetime of the gold layer. Additionally, because silver is always the base metal in vermeil, it is a more hypoallergenic option.

Note: The lifetime of gold plated and vermeil jewelry can be prolonged by keeping the jewelry away from perfumes, chemicals, skin oils, and taking care not to rub the metal. It may be possible to re-plate the jewelry as well.