Gold Jewelry

[willowtree99]

One thing I've noticed over the last few decades is fewer women wearing gold jewelry.

Im not talking high fashion, celebs and catwalk, but ordinary people.

All the women I knew of my granny's age always wore chunky wedding rings, engagement and other dress rings as well as solid earrings, young women would have gold necklaces and earring as gifts for special birthdays.

Now the fashion for wedding rings is slim, you rarely see women in public wearing gold.

Is it a trend thing, that gold is old fashioned/crass, a safety thing where women are worried about wearing valuables in public, a finances thing that gold is more expensive now and money is tighter?

Or am I just in different circles and gold is as popular as ever?

Yabu - gold is as popular as ever
Yanbu - I've noticed this too.

I think there are multiple reasons

1. Gold used to be seen as a woman's insurance policy in the case of needing to leave her family/husband or becoming a widow. SIt was something that belonged to her and her alone that her husband/father could not take. SO the heavier, the better.
2. The price of gold has increased, it is expensive
3. There is a wider range available. White gold is popular and silver is a lot cheaper.
4. People buy what they like, rather than based on the above. So the fashion for more dainty items

I get what you mean, I feel like my older relatives had/have quite a jewellery collection and lots of pieces to choose from.

I was given necklace and earrings for special birthdays, have a wedding ring, but other than that dont own much special jewellery unless I buy it for myself.

I dont suit silver so I always wear gold. Isually a necklace, 2 rings and bangle. I think plenty of people wear thin chains with a pendant, layered necklaces or a T bar. Monica Vinader style stuff.

I think a lot.of.it is due to.cost. both gold and silver have increased in price vastly in the past 20 years.

ive just recently gone back to gold. Wore white gold for many years. But yes I have noticed it definitely isn’t as popular any more. I always remember my nan wore so much gold, just don’t see it anymore

I think it’s mostly a trend thing - platinum and white gold seem to be more fashionable for engagement and wedding rings these days.

I’ve never worn yellow gold, but only because I look awful in it. I’ve always worn silver and white gold, ever since I was a little girl in the 1980s.

I got engaged 25 years ago and chose a platinum ring, I've never liked gold.

I think fashion is a big part of it. Obviously some people always preferred silver colour jewellery (silver, platinum, white gold) but I do think it’s more in fashion now. And fashions for metals probably change a lot more slowly than fashions for jeans or whatever.

My friends from wealthier families still seem to have a range of lovely yellow gold pieces, whereas my friends from less affluent backgrounds prefer platinum or white gold. I'm not sure my straw poll of one counts, but it's a thing I've noticed. I'm in the much less affluent group, btw.

I think part of it is while the price of bullion has increased, the resale value of gold jewellery eg at a secondhand jeweller or “we buy gold” place is still very little so more people have realised it’s not a great investment (just like most diamonds under a certain price). Also places like Argos and Index used to sell tinfoil gold jewellery 25 years ago and it lasted 5 minutes before getting deformed, and looked awful even new, and those awful curb chains were huge around the same time. Gold got a bit of a bad reputation that it’s never quite shaken off. The stuff available new now is ridiculously expensive for the fact it’s generally only 37.5% gold (aka 9 carat). So women are being smarter as they’re not buying the (insanely overpriced) gold jewellery for sale in jewellery shops. I don’t know what they’re spending it on instead, I’d like to think it was going into their pension but it’s probably going on fillers.
Annoyingly, the price of silver jewellery is getting very inflated and even more detached from the bullion price, now, and sometimes I see (non-designer, mass-produced) silver pieces at prices I can barely believe, given its relative abundance and lack of complexity to work with.

A couple of weddings I went to over the summer involved platinum wedding rinhs for both the bride and groom - apparently platinum is currently cheaper than gold.

Goldie gold can easily look a bit chavvy if you’re not careful!

I only wear silver, white gold and platinum.

I think it used to be a bit of a conscious display of wealth/financial security, plus something a husband gave a woman as store of value that she owned. I'm not too bothered about that, i earn good money in my own right and don't need to display it

Never really thought about it. My circle mostly wears gold. I wear a 22ct gold wedding ring and an 18ct gold engagement ring. It looks nice.

Wouldn’t wear white gold as wouldn’t want the faff of replating it. Don’t like the patina of platinum.

I shall now keep an eye out and see what other people are wearing!

I think it’s from a safety point of view. Went on to a tram recently with two older ladies sitting opposite, in to their 70s I would say. I noticed their abundance of gold rings and necklaces and thought straight away they shouldn’t be wearing that much gold out and about as it’s dangerous, although they appeared fine with it, but I wouldn’t do it in my mid 30s. Gold is worth a lot of money now a days.

I've never liked yellow gold (even when I was a small child 50 years ago) and I don't see a lot of point paying for white gold when silver is so much cheaper. I do have some white gold jewellery but 98% of what I own is silver.

it's cost

I only wear gold jewellery, it suits my warm skin tone better than silver. I’ve bought myself a few classic bits and dh often buys me gold for my birthday or Christmas - my grandma always told me to look after my gold and keep it safe in case of emergencies and I never really understood what she meant.
saying that I don’t wear my jewellery very often as I don’t like the feeling of it - it’s fine until I remember it’s there and then I’m itching to rip it off 😂😂

I guess your grandmother meant that gold will always be saleable, or pawnable, if you urgently need cash. Wise woman!

I do remember an auntie, who is very close in age to me, wearing several layers of gold chains, rings and earrings everyday in the 80s and 90s and I don’t think she’s changed her style too much now. I always disliked that look and as PPs have said, it was actually pretty cheap Argos stuff, so fairly lightweight.

Gold is definitely making a comeback as people seek 70s style vintage jewellery. There was a big trend for diamond solitaire platinum set engagement rings and we’re seeing a trend towards colourful and more organic designs in yellow gold right now.

we’re also seeing a big trend in bespoke jewellery where people are encouraged to get involved in the process, which will usually lend itself to a more organic look.

There are so many engagement rings nowadays that are cluster rings, rather than solitaires. I can see the attraction as they are pretty and sparkly, but they seem so expensive compared to 20 years ago or so, when I got engaged and DH bought me a (small) diamond solitaire in white gold for about £100. It does feel like people are being ripped off paying £££ for a cluster of tiny diamonds that are probably just offcuts from more expensive solitaires. I know absolutely nothing about the diamond/jewellery industry, though, so happy to be corrected.

My friends wear gold, but not huge amounts and quite dainty pieces. I'm the only one who wears silver. I have one pair of gold earrings but no rings to wear with them! (Birthday coming up...)
But I went to visit an elderly relative recently. She's housebound but was wearing a lot of gold - earrings, lots of bracelets, several thin necklaces. She was wearing all black and has gorgeous white hair. She looked fabulous! I was v. impressed that she wore all that even though she wasn't leaving the house, just for her own pleasure.

Yeah, maybe it's the white gold trend that I am mistaking for silver.

Like you I don’t particularly like yellow gold, but white gold doesn’t tarnish. Silver tarnishes so needs regular cleaning if you want to keep the shine. I generally don't wear jewellery the exception being some stud earrings (subtle gold clasp each holding a small moonstone) which belonged to my great grandmother.

I wear gold. Always did. Byut all mine came from ME or NA. As pp said. Who would be buying overpriced 9k stuff. I also wear silver. I don't bother with white gold.

I think a lot of it is to do with trends and what’s in fashion at any given time.
Also people seem more aware these days of what suits their colouring - all the fancy online tools for matching a foundation shade really focus on the undertones of your skin, and it’s the same with jewellery. If the veins in your wrist look more blue on the surface, you have cool-toned skin that will suit silver/platinum/white gold jewellery better, and if the veins look more green, you have warm-toned skin that will suit yellow gold better.
I’m very cool toned, so have a white gold engagement ring with a black diamond set among white diamonds. But both me and my DH went for matching black tungsten wedding bands