Women's Jewelry

The stamp inside a clasp or a ring band:

tells you which of four very different things you are holding. Solid gold carries its karat as 10K, 14K or 18K, or as 417, 585 or 750, the parts per thousand of pure gold. In Panama 10k and 14k are the everyday karats, harder-wearing than 18k, which is yellower and softer. Plated and gold-filled pieces may be marked GP, GF or HGE, or not marked at all. Sterling silver reads 925 and darkens in a drawer. Stainless steel neither tarnishes nor marks the skin, and costs the least. How a piece will be worn matters as much as what it is. Plating survives earrings for a wedding and wears thin on a ring worn daily, rubbing through wherever metal meets skin. A fine gold chain is light for its price but gives way at the links. Pandora Moments charms thread onto any round Pandora bracelet, so bracelet and charms can be bought apart. A watch for the wrist stack is with women’s watches, and hair clips and scarves with the other women’s accessories.

Filigree flowers and the gold chains of the national dress:

a full gala outfit is worn with a whole set of gold, built around a flat chain of hinged, engraved plaques, with further chains layered beneath it, long earrings and gold combs in the hair. Specialist goldsmiths make these pieces in filigree, in gold, usually 10k, or in silver plated with gold, and their worth lies more in the handwork than in the metal. The flower of pearls, coral or turquoise set in fine gold wire is the piece most often worn away from the dress, as earrings or a pendant. With an inherited set, find out first which chains are gold and which are gilded silver, because in a photo they look the same.

Gold sold by weight, and why filigree is worth more:

a gold buyer pays for the metal alone, weighing the piece, testing the karat and paying the day’s gold price, broken or not. That is the floor under any solid gold piece, so a snapped chain is worth as much as a whole one. Handmade filigree is worth well above that floor to a woman who dances in the national dress, so a pearl flower or a flat chain should be offered to her before it goes on a scale. Branded silver runs the other way: a sterling Pandora bracelet starts around $90 new before a single charm goes on, and a used one fetches far less, because the same bracelet is always back on the counter. Plated jewelry has no metal value at all.

Plating worn through at the clasp:

gives away a piece sold as gold faster than anything. Look where it rubs, at the clasp, the back of a ring band and the posts of earrings, for a pinkish or grey metal showing through. Read the stamp under a magnifier. A blurred stamp, or a piece that jumps to a magnet, ends the conversation, though a magnet that does not pull proves little, since brass is not magnetic either. Genuine Pandora is stamped ALE with S925 for silver or G585 for gold, except on the smallest pieces, but copies carry the stamps too, so judge the finish of the threads and clasp as well. Check that a chain’s clasp snaps shut and its links have not stretched. For gold that costs real money, meet where a jeweller can test it.

Weighing a gold chain before you list it:

gives a buyer the one number they will check for themselves, and a kitchen scale that reads fractions of a gram is enough. Photograph the stamp close up in daylight, then the clasp, then the piece laid flat beside a ruler, and give chain lengths and ring sizes. Say plainly whether each piece is solid, plated or silver, and for a family set worn with the national dress, which pieces are gilded. Keep the box or receipt with a branded piece: it is what persuades a buyer in David or Chitré to make the trip. Expect anyone serious about gold to arrive with a loupe and a magnet.