Wedding Rings - BrightWeddingIdeas.com

Purchasing the right jewelry for the wedding is very important. Many couples prefer to shop for rings together, while some the groom likes to surprise his future wife with his resourcefulness and creativity, shopping for her ring by himself. In the latter case, the groom should make sure to know the tastes of his future wife and purchase something that matches her engagement ring or something that she likes on its own (some girls like wearing the wedding band a different hand from the engagement ring).

Generally speaking, when shopping for a ring we suggest sticking to these three simple rules: look for a style you will always love, pick the metal (and color) that flatters you most and make sure the metal is marked.

Wedding Idea: The best place to buy jewelry is online. Diamonds and precious metals are generally a commodity and supplied to both retail and online stores by wholesalers at essentially the same rates. Since online stores have the lowest overhead, they tend to pass the savings to you by offering the lowest prices. These include such online jewelry stores as Blue Nile.

Trend-wise, platinum has become very popular, although gold remains a good economical alternative. If your budget for the wedding rings is rather limited, consider getting a titanium wedding band. Titanium is a very strong and hard metal and for that reason make sure you like the wedding band design, because it will be very difficult to change in the future.

Gold wedding bands will typically have 14-, 18- or 24-karat marks on the inner side. The nomenclature means they contain 58.5%, 75% and 100% of gold in them. The 24k gold is very soft and bends easier than 18k or 14k gold. The remaining metals in the mixture often give these rings different shades of color. For example, the presence of silver results in greenish color, that of nickel - white, while that of copper - red.

White gold is very popular in wedding rings as well. A white gold ring would essentially be the same 14k or 18k gold ring, except with additive of nickel, as opposed to silver, which makes it look white.

Wedding Idea: White gold is a good substitute for platinum since it looks similar and yet costs 40% less. Consider it if you have a limited budget. However, beware that bringing back the luster of a white gold wedding ring can cost more in the long run than that of a platinum one. The reason for that is the need to add rhodium to white gold to make it look like new. Whereas, bringing back platinum's luster requires just burnishing (polishing).

Platinum is a much more rare and purer metal. It is much heavier and denser than gold (both white and yellow). It is also more difficult to work with. As a result, platinum jewelry is noticeably more expensive than gold. Despite its rarity and high prices the demand for platinum wedding bands has been extremely high.

Wedding Idea: For the groom - if you decide to buy a ring on your own and present it to your fiancée as a gift, try to learn indirectly about her tastes, including her favorite diamond shapes and metals, as well as her ring size. You can just point at some ring you may see together and say you really like it to observe her reaction and pick up some cues. Sometimes she will let you know what she likes in a subtle way. So listen!

Did you know that in the U.S. $1,015 is the average cost of wedding rings for the bride and groom?

Did you know that the most popular month for proposals is December, which accounts for 15% of all proposals?