Rebecca Zemans Jewelry Blog — recycled metals

Our next blog post in this metal series is about 22K gold, a softer metal containing at least 92% pure gold. 22K gold is often used for more intricate designs because it can be shaped and bent into all kinds of forms fairly easily. While 22K gold is very common in some countries, it is much less common in the United States where 14K gold is the most common gold used in jewelry. 22K gold contains a very high amount of pure gold (92%), which gives it a very rich and beautiful yellow color. As mentioned above, 22K gold is also...

We hope everyone has been having an excellent summer!  The studio has been busy working with couples to create special wedding bands all season long, as well as custom tailored anniversary and birthday presents.  Our favorite projects always seem to involve heriloom materials and the transformation which takes place in using something old to create something new. Our most recent heirloom redesign was for a client's wedding band using elements of a ring from her Oma.  Our client works with her hands and needed a durable wedding band that suits her lifestyle, yet wanted to incorporate materials from family heirloom...

Today we will be continuing our metals series with 18K Gold! We recently worked on a couple of really cool 18K gold pieces, so we are excited to give you some more information on this beautiful metal! First of, as you might have already guessed, 18K gold is more valuable than 14K gold because of it high gold content. In order for gold to be considered 18K it needs to contain at least 75% pure gold. Because it has such a high amount of pure gold in it, 18K has a very beautiful and rich color. It is also quite...

Mike Stephen, host of Outside the Loop, a WGN 720am radio show that airs on Saturdays at 6am came to visit the studio a few weeks ago to talk about what I do. It was so much fun to have him record the sounds of the studio and chat about my process and inspiration. Click here to have a listen. You'll find me at the 8-minute mark. Enjoy!    

Hi Everyone! Today we are continuing our metals blog series with a post about fine silver. In case you missed it, in our previous post we discussed sterling silver, which is an alloy of fine silver. Fine silver is 99.9% pure silver, compared to sterling silver which is only 92.5% pure silver. Fine silver is very soft, making it more prone to scratches and dents. On the bright side, its softness is the reason fine silver pieces tend to mend themselves to your body and can be very comfortable to wear. It also does not tarnish, which is great if...