THE JEWELRY SHINE

Archive for December, 2009

There are many different names for silver jewellery on the market today. So, what are all these types of silver and what do they mean?

This article will educate you so you understand what the different terminologies are when you are buying silver jewellery or silver articles.

What is silver?

Silver is a metal which has been used for hundreds of years. Silver is mined from many countries but the biggest producers are Mexico, Peru and Australia.

Silver in its pure form, is normally considered too soft for everyday use. Therefore, other metals are added to the pure silver such as cooper.

The different types of “Silver”

Sterling silver is the main type of silver used in jewellery, ornaments & dinnerware today. This is solid silver. Sterling silver is a mixture of 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% metal alloy.

Sterling silver is hallmarked as “925”.

Fine silver is 99.9% pure silver and is normally considered too soft to use for most items. It is also solid silver.

Silver plating is common and sometimes dishonest sellers try to pass this off as sterling silver. It’s also call electroplated silver or silver coated as well. Silver plated items are made using a base metal, normally brass or nickel, which is then put through an electroplating process. Electroplating is a process which adheres a very very thin layer of pure silver onto the base metal.

The result is a sterling silver looking item at a much reduced price. It may look like sterling silver but the silver plating tends to wear off quite quickly exposing the less than beautiful base metal.

Alpaca Silver or German Silver is not actually silver at all. It is a greyish looking alloy which resembles silver. It is sometimes referred to as nickel silver, paktong, and new silver. It is also used as a base for silver plated items because of its appearance. If you want real silver, stay away from this. Also, beware of sellers selling this as “fine jewellery” to consumers that don’t know the difference between sterling silver and alpaca silver.

Mexican Silver is silver is used to describe silver made in Mexico. It must have more than 90% pure silver content to be Mexican silver. Most silver jewellery from Mexico today is actually sterling silver.

Britannia Silver has a pure silver content of 95.85% and no more than 4.16% copper. This silver is marked in the U.K. and Ireland as “958 silver.” It is an even more pure form of silver than sterling silver. Hence it’s higher valuer.

Antiquing of Sterling Silver Jewellery

Antiquing is very common in the silver industry today and is the practice of applying a finishing process to sterling silver to give the item an appearance of age. As well as giving the item an appearance of age, it also helps to produce a contrast which makes the details of intricate designs stand out better.

Other guides

There are many other guides at our online jewellery store Australia. www.2mydoor.com.au

Kids jewellery has become very popular and a wonderful range of jewellery articles for children are available for all age groups. Moms love to doll up their little ones with fancy and attractive jewels. Fascinating and stylish articles are available for infants to teenage girls and boys.

Kids� jewels include; fancy hair pins, pony tails, bracelets, earrings, chains, charms and pendants. Earrings and hair accessories are popularly used all over the world. Charms are used for adorning little babies. Charms are known for their magical powers to ward off evil eye so they are preferred for young kids to protect them from harmful forces.

Chains are also commonly used articles for children. Simple delicate chains are more suitable for kids as they are light weight and less expensive. Teenage girls love to wear captivating and stylish bracelets with matching rings. Girls also like to have dangling earrings of different attractive styles.

The material used for making kids jewellery should be chosen carefully. Children�s skin is very sensitive and may be allergic to certain metals. Cheap and inferior quality of metal should be avoided for children�s items. Before buying jewels for your little one you should know the metal your kid is allergic to. Some kids are allergic to nickel while other may not be able to use gold jewels. It varies from child to child.

Exciting and modern articles for kids are available in a variety of metals and designs. Boys also like to wear jewels including wrist bands, earrings and chains. Girls love wearing delicate and trendy necklaces with colorful beads and stones. Pendants can be a good choice to be used as gifts for children. Pendants come in different shapes including; hearts, animals, butterflies, letters, bells and other lovely shapes. Earrings of gold and silver with a birthstone of your child can be a beautiful present on her birthday.

It may sound a bit of a surprise, but the jewelry is not made of pure noble metals as in their original state they don’t often have the necessary properties. For instance, gold is too soft to work with. To give them the necessary mechanical properties and a wishful color nonferrous metals are brought into. Thus, we get different alloys, for example, that of gold with silver and copper, sometimes with palladium, nickel, zinc and cadmium.It is the precious metal content that determines the mark of quality.

In the USA, Britain and Switzerland the carat system is used. According to the carat system the 1000th mark of quality of the precious metal corresponds to 24 conventional units. In most European countries the metric system of the mark defining is used. It means that it is defined by the number of parts of the precious metal in 1000 weight units of the alloy.

The quality mark of precious metals alloys is set legislatively and is guaranteed by the state. All the jewelry necessarily undergoes the assay control to ensure it. As a result the mark of assay is put. The mark is defined by its digits. It’s up to a country to choose the form and the pattern of the mark of assay.

Very widely used in jewelry are 18k gold alloys as their properties are most suitable to work with. They contain: silver – 7,0%- 15,0% , palladium – up to 14%,
nickel – up to 4%, zinc up to 2,4%, nickel – 7,5% – 16,5%, zinc – 2,0% – 5,0%, copper – up to 15%.

Another popular alloy is 14k gold. The alloys of this standard can have different colors. The color is influenced by the qualitative ratio of the ferrous metals.
For instance, if 14k gold alloy (58, 3% – gold) contains silver – 36% and copper 5, 7% the alloy gets a greenish color. With silver- 18,3% and copper -23,4% – the pink one. With silver 8,3% and copper 33,4% – a reddish color.

The so-called white gold is often used in the jewelry with diamonds. The 14k white gold alloy contains: silver – 23,7% – 28,7%, palladium – 13,0% – 18%, nickel -
17%, zinc – 8,7%, copper – 16%. The 18k white gold alloy contains: silver – 7,0% – 15,0% , palladium – up to 14%, nickel – up to 4%, zinc up to 2,4%, nickel – 7,5% – 16,5%, zinc – 2,0% – 5,0%, copper – up to 15%.

The gold alloy of the 958th standard (metric system) or 24k is not durable and that is why rarely used. The gold alloy of the 375th standard or 10k contains: gold – 37,5%, silver – 10,0%, copper – 48%, palladium – 3,8%. Jewelry containing less than 37.5% of gold is not considered gold jewelry.

The most widely used is the silver alloy containing 92.5% silver and 7.5% alloy. It is used for the jewelry and the cutlery. The silver and brass stuff is frequently covered with a thin layer of rhodium or silver of the 999th standard (silvering).