Things to remember while buying gold jewelry1. Things to Remember while buying Gold Jewelry
by Anika Pathak jewelry designer & author
Overview
The only color of gold that is available to it naturally is yellow gold. This is also the most common color gold
comes in and the most common color gold that is used in making jewellery. Pure gold, however, happens to
be too soft for making jewellery and to be used for wearing every day. This gold, therefore, needs to be
alloyed with other metals to be able to be used in making jewellery. Metals like silver, zinc, nickel and copper
are used to strengthen this kind of gold. This is the reason, the color of a gold bar differs from that of a ring.
Golden yellow is the only color of gold as it is found in nature and is by far the most common type of gold
used in jewelry. However, pure gold is too soft for everyday wear, so it is alloyed with a mixture of metals
like copper, silver, zinc and nickel to strengthen it.
White Gold & Pink Gold
Some of the most widely preferred alternatives to gold that are available today are pink gold and white gold.
In order to give gold a white hue, it is alloyed with metals that are white in color. The most common metals
that are used as alloys in making white gold jewellery are palladium, platinum, manganese and nickel.
Sometimes metals like silver, zinc and copper are also used in making white gold jewellery.
Even after going through this process of alloying, the color of white gold remains a mere light grey. That is
the reason white gold jewellery needs to be coated with a metal called rhodium that allows the white gold to
wear an even whiter appearance.