About Gem & Gild
A jewelry site that reads the regulations, compiles the published specifications, does the arithmetic - and tells you plainly what it has not done.
What this site is for
Almost every confusing thing about buying jewelry comes down to one question that sellers are not required to answer clearly: how much of the material you think you are buying is actually there?
A listing can say “18K gold” when the gold is a coating measured in millionths of a meter. It can say “hypoallergenic” on metal containing the exact alloy most people react to. It can say “sterling” on the setting and never mention that the stone will go cloudy in three years. None of that is illegal, and all of it is incomplete.
Gem & Gild exists to close that gap. Every page here does the same three things: names the material honestly, states what the specification means in months of wear, and gives you a price you can act on.
Who writes it
Stephen V.. Stephen V. writes Gem & Gild. He is an enthusiast - someone genuinely interested in what jewelry is made of and what that should cost. He reads the standards, compiles the published specifications, and does the arithmetic. No lab coat, no test bench, and no claim to have handled the pieces on this site.
That framing is deliberate and it is not modesty. We do not have a gemologist, an appraiser, a lab or a testing bench, and we are not going to imply otherwise. What we have is the willingness to read 16 CFR Part 23 properly, pull the specifications a listing does publish, and work out what they mean.
What we do, specifically
- Read the regulation. The US FTC Jewelry Guides define what “gold-filled”, “vermeil”, “gold plated” and “sterling” legally require. Those thresholds - 0.175 microns, 2.5 microns, 1/20 by weight, 925/1000 - are quoted from the regulation itself, not from another site’s retelling of it.
- Compile the published specifications. What each listing actually states about its own material - and, just as usefully, what it declines to state.
- Do the arithmetic. Thickness to months of wear against a stated wear model; price divided by realistic lifespan to give a cost per year. Every assumption is written down so you can disagree with it.
- Cite the sources. Every page carries a sources block with links you can check.
What we have not done
We have not handled any of the jewelry on this site. Not worn it, not weighed it, not tested it, not photographed it. Every product image comes from the retailer.
Every jewelry site says it tested its picks. We have not, and we say so, because the alternative is a claim that is both false and trivially falsifiable. What we do instead is genuinely useful and it is genuinely what we do.
- Products we claim to have tested
- 0
- Sponsored placements
- 0
- Free products accepted
- 0
All three are categories where zero is the number you want. They are claims we refuse to make, not capabilities we are short of.
The rules we hold ourselves to
- A plated item is called plated, on every page, every time. The karat number describes the coating and we say so.
- Prices come only from a live data layer. No price on this site was ever typed in by hand, and prices older than 48 hours disappear on their own rather than going quietly stale.
- No invented ratings, reviews or testimonials. There are none anywhere on this site, because we have no customers and no test results.
- Every roundup names something to skip. Usually a popular product whose material does not match its price.
- Where a figure is not published, we say so rather than estimating a flattering one.
The site as it stands
82 content pages across five sections, and 93 products in the registry, each resolved to a live retailer listing rather than remembered.
Read how we pick for the scoring, and how we make money for the commercial side in plain English. Both are short.
Who publishes it
Gem & Gild is published by Type 5 Marketing LLC. It is a national publisher with no storefront, no showroom and no premises to visit. If you want to reach us, the contact page has the only email address we use.