Platinum is a precious metal, which is pure and naturally white metal never wears away. Platinum is NOT a new metal for jewelry as it was used for decoration by both ancient Egyptian and Inca civilizations. In modern times, Platinum was the first metal capable of securely holding diamonds in a delicate framework and led to creation of beautiful Art Deco pieces of the 1920′s. Even today, the elegance of platinum continues to enchant new generations.

There are lots of differences between platinum and gold – White or yellow. Even though white gold looks like platinum, but white gold is NOT a naturally white metal. We’ll get white gold from the yellow gold metal only. To achieve a white look, yellow gold is alloyed with various other metals and the white colour is further enhanced by plating the piece with rhodium. These plating could very well wear away after sometime and reveals yellow-grey colour underneath.  Platinum, whereas, is pure and naturally white metal. Even the scratch on platinum is merely a displacement of the metal and volume is still not lost. Also, platinum develops a natural patina – which many people find attractive as a polished finish. Platinum is unique among all metals by virtue of its sheer rarity and there is very little platinum available on this earth.

Precious metal platinum is a dense metal and weighs 40% more than 18K gold. So, a simple platinum wedding band is noticeably heavier than the same ring made of gold. Platinum is more expensive than gold as the main reason is simply the rarest of the rare. Also, platinum jewelry is 95% pure platinum metal compared to 75% pure yellow metal of 18K gold jewelry. Platinum jewelry is hypoallergenic as it’s 95% pure and so ideal for sensitive skins. Finally, making of a piece of platinum jewelry requires a higher level of craftsmanship.

Each piece of platinum jewelry carries the “Pt 950″ Mark to know that the piece of platinum jewelry, we are buying is really platinum metal. The Mark ‘Pt 950′ is our symbol of authenticity and denotes 95% purity i.e. 950 parts out of a 1000. Also, all platinum jewelry has a unique identification number. The Quality Assurance Card, (like guaranty card) comes with the purchase of each platinum jewelry, carries this unique identification number along with the weight and the purity of the jewelry we are buying. With every purchase of platinum jewelry, we should insist on this Quality Assurance Card. We should make sure that the platinum jewelry, which we are purchasing, has a purity of at least 95%.

It’s prudent to purchase our platinum jewelry from a PGI authorized retailer. We can look for the authorized retailer signage outside the store as well as the PGI license inside the store. All PGI authorized retailer’s offers a buy-back on platinum jewelry and the policy for buy-back is the same as that of any other precious jewelry like gold. These retailers will ask for the Quality Assurance Card. One of the key factors determining buy-back value is the precious metal content in the jewelry. Platinum represents true value and platinum jewelry has one of the highest precious metal content at 95%.