Silver Hip Hop Jewelry - Does it Look Different From White Gold Hip Hop Jewelry?

2009-04-07T07:45:00.000-07:00

Silver has been the metal of choice for many years used for the fabrication of hip hop jewelry. Since the fashion jewelry world began transitioning to a white metal look as early as 15 years ago hip hop jewelry style has followed suit where the look is entirely in white metal. this being the case, the obvious choice became silver as it could be easily fashioned, it was cheap at $12 per oz, and most jewelry factories in the far east could easily set up to cast, file, polish and set silver jewelry pieces.

Most factories in Thailand were already doing brisk business in fashion jewelry made out of silver. The Thai manufacturers were the pioneers in taking silver jewelry style to a new level on the manufacturing side. Factories in China followed soon after.

Silver hip hop jewelry does not look that different from white gold hip hop jewelry. With up to 5 microns of rhodium plating it will look the same as white gold because 14kt or 18kt white gold goes through the same plating process. The difference will be in the heft of the piece because white gold is the denser metal . There will also be a difference in quality of gems in the piece.

Silver hip hop pendants, silver hip hop rings, and silver hip hop earrings will typically sport colored and white cubic zirconia stones instead of real sapphires and diamonds. Cubic zirconia to the layman may look like the real McCoy but the telltale flasshes of rainbow colors that CZ is known for will give it away. These flashes can be seen even if you're looking at CZ from a distance.

In the case of large silver hip hop stud earrings, these colorful rainbow flashes indicating a much higher dispersion than diamond will easily be noticeable to anyone who has seen cubic zirconia and diamond of similar size and shape together. Cubic zirconia has the optical quality of high dispersion or splitting white light into its component rainbow of colors. On sterling silver hip hop earrings with stones that are 7mm in diameter or larger, this effect can easily be seen. Generally, the larger the cubic zirconia, the more noticeable this optical effect is. The shape of the cubic zirconia may also emphasize or mask this effect.

Replica Hip Hop Jewelry

2009-04-07T07:31:00.000-07:00

Replica Hip Hop jewelry is all the rage as young people who follow hip hop music and rap want to look like their favorite artists whether its the looks pioneered by Snoop Dogg and DMC Run or some of the newer artists like fifty cent.

Replica hip hop pendants, replica hip hop dog tags, replica hip hop earrings, and replica hip hop rings are not that hard to reproduce. All that's needed are a few pictures of the original piece at different angles and a skilled bench jeweler or goldsmith can reproduce probably 90% of the likeness of the original piece.

Hip hop replica jewelry is usually identified with hip hop pendants worn by famous rap artists because these are the largest hip hop pieces of jewelry and are most identified with a particular rap artist as being their innate style. A hip hop artist's stud earrings or bracelet are not as visible and so less likely to experience any demand for a replica.

I'm sure that the commercial with Snoop Dogg and David Bowie that showed Snoop looking for his lost hip hop dog tag that spelled out Snoop in big iced out letters drives home the point that replica silver dog tags is big business.