It is amazing that just a few years ago men’s ring selections amounted to an anemic range. There were very few choices for men, while there was much, much more for women. Now men have caught up and it may be too much for the simple male. Along with the precious metal choices a whole new collection of industrial metals have been added.

The traditional metal choices are gold, silver, and platinum. You can now add palladium to that category. These precious metals can be combined in a myriad of ways. Gold by itself can come in colors of yellow, white, rose, and green, and these can be combined together or with platinum or palladium. There are still purists that would like to keep to one metal only, but the choices and styles appear to be endless as more companies are entering with their unique lines.

Yellow gold ring, White gold ring, Two-tone ring, Platinum ring.

We now have a whole bunch of industrial metals that are being used for men’s rings. We say industrial because these metals were used primarily for more utilitarian purposes. These metals that are now being made into jewelry are stainless steel, surgical steel, titanium, and tungsten. There is also Damascus steel, and ceramic, a non-metal. These metals have commercial applications that appeal to the working male psyche. Let us break these down a bit.

Tungsten, Tungsten with black diamond, tungsten with carbon fiber, ceramic, and tungsten with ceramic rings.

Ever popular is tungsten which was originally used as drill tips and saw blade tips. This is a very hard metal that can be rubbed over a cement floor and will not scratch. Its hardness makes it a bit brittle and if dropped onto a hard surface may chip or crack. Its hardness and darkish gun metal gray color appeals to a man’s senses. It can now be combined with platinum, gold, palladium, carbon fiber, ceramic, Damascus steel and mokume, to create a ton of choices. Simple tungsten ring cost $100 and more for inlays depending on the type used.

The ceramic ring is not the ceramic that you may be thinking of it is not your cups and saucer ceramic. The material is zirconia ceramic made from aluminum oxide crystals and the only thing that is harder than this ceramic is a diamond. Ceramic of this type is commercially used in the medical and industrial field as in bone joints and ball bearings, to name a few. The color of ceramic currently used in men’s jewelry is black. Rings can be made in ceramic alone are plain or come with designs etched into them or also combined with tungsten to offer a nice contrasting color design. It is inexpensive, costing a little over $100 to $250.

There are now rings made of Damascus steel. Damascus steel has patterns that look like wood grain patterns because they are made by folding two or more different color steels into each other. It can be acid etched to bring out a more raised grain pattern and to color the metal. It can be used as an inlay with other metals. When this method of folding metals into each other is used using precious metals it is called “Mokume”, which can also be made into rings or used as inlay material. Rings generally cost from $325 on up depending on size and width and materials used.

Damascus rings

Titanium is a metal known for its strength and light weight. There is a type of titanium that is alloyed with other metals to produce a light weight metal that is five times harder than pure titanium which makes it highly scratch resistant. The rings made of this type of titanium are very durable. They can be also combined with other metals and inlayed and etched. Cost ranges $100 for plain titanium and more for combinations of other metals and inlays.

To complete the men’s selection of rings is stainless steel. Cost is relatively inexpensive at $25 -$150. Most men would rather spend more on their wedding ring but may choose stainless steel as fashion jewelry.

So, men what do you think is this much choice a good thing?

Mahalo,
Russell Oshita
The Diamond Specialists Inc.
Our website: www.thediamondspecialistsinc.com
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