Which material is best suited for children's jewelry?
Why is the right material for children's jewelry important?
Children's tastes change quickly. And to make matters worse, children also like to be a little rough with their jewelry.
Fashion jewelry is much cheaper than high-quality jewelry made of precious metals. So it doesn't hurt so much at first glance if the children's jewelry doesn't last as long.
We at Love Your Diamonds have opted for a different approach:
High-quality materials: Our children's jewelry is made from genuine precious metal alloys.
Tested safety: It is examined by the Bavarian State Office for Health and Food Safety.
Health-conscious: Not only is it colorful and beautiful, it also does not harm your children's sensitive skin.
Here we reveal the reasons why fashion jewelry is a bad idea and why choosing the right material is so important.
Click here to see our child-friendly jewelry!
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Contact allergies due to incorrect material
Children's jewelry should not only be beautiful, but also safe and skin-friendly. Choosing the right material for children's jewelry therefore plays a crucial role. This is the only way to avoid skin irritation and ensure durability.
Using the wrong material can cause contact allergies. This happens when the immune system overreacts to certain substances in children's jewelry. When worn, the metal releases tiny particles that penetrate the upper layer of children's skin through sweat or skin contact.
The body recognizes these substances as foreign bodies and reacts with an allergic reaction. Symptoms include itching, redness, blisters or eczema.
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Which materials cause contact allergies?
Nickel is one of the most common contact allergens in Europe. The Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (BVL) has repeatedly found that the limit values for nickel in fashion jewelry have been exceeded. Nickel is therefore mainly found in cheap costume jewelry products.
For example, nickel is also hidden in many pieces of jewelry made of brass. Although brass is an alloy of copper and zinc, other elements such as aluminum, iron or nickel can be added to a brass alloy as required. This can quickly turn brass into a trigger for contact allergies.
The same applies to stainless steel, whose various alloys can also contain nickel.
Chromium, cobalt and aluminum are also occasionally found in jewelry samples by the BVL. These elements are also allergologically relevant and can trigger contact allergies in your children.
Dangerous heavy metals in fashion jewelry
Not only contact allergens such as nickel are a problem in costume jewelry. Tragically, the BVL also repeatedly finds lead and cadmium in children's jewelry above the applicable limits. These heavy metals pose a clear health risk for children.
This is because the intake of heavy metals can lead to serious damage to health. Lead, for example, can affect children's nervous systems. Cadmium can damage their kidneys and bones.
As a few pieces of jewelry were tested by the BVL and found to consist almost entirely of lead or cadmium, even the Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety advises caution when buying cheap costume jewelry.
This is because children in particular are likely to put the jewelry in their mouths frequently. If the lead or cadmium content in the material of the children's jewelry is too high, this can result in serious poisoning.
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Silver and gold as a safe material
Silver and gold are recommended as materials for children's jewelry primarily because they do not cause allergies. And that's not all. Silver and gold are considered bacteria-repellent. This means that these precious metals can even help to prevent infections from developing in the first place.
The use of nanosilver, for example, is said to prevent bacteria from growing. The use of nanosilver can even kill some pathogens completely. This is one reason why many medical products such as wound dressings or catheters are coated with silver.
When using gold nanoparticles, the University of Melbourne was able to observe how bacteria that came into contact with them died in batches.
It can therefore be said with a clear conscience that pure silver and gold can safely be considered suitable materials for children's jewelry from a health perspective.
However, pure silver and gold are very soft. So soft that they are not really suitable for processing into long-lasting jewelry. This is why they are mixed with other metals to create a silver or gold alloy.
The best-known silver alloy is probably 925 sterling silver. Here, the alloy consists of 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% added metals, usually copper. The best-known gold alloys are 333, 375, 585 or 750 gold. As with silver, the number describes the proportion of gold. With 750 gold, the alloy therefore consists of 75% pure gold and 25% alloyed metals (mostly silver and copper, sometimes also palladium, for example).
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Conclusion: Which material is suitable?
The BVL tests show that it is much rarer for high-quality jewelry made of genuine precious metal alloys to exceed the limit values for materials of concern than for inexpensive costume jewelry. However, in order to be able to rule out the use of lead, cadmium or nickel in our jewelry with absolute certainty, there is another important aspect:
Our jewelry is checked for you.
We at Love Your Diamonds want you to be able to let your children wear children's jewelry with a clear conscience.
That's why the Bavarian State Office for Health and Food Safety tests our jewelry for you.
In the process, compliance with all legally required values for nickel within the jewelry is verified, as well as for cadmium or lead. We have also complied with the stricter regulations for evaluating the results, which have been in place since 2012, in all tests without exception.
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Not only suitable, but sustainable
Sustainability is an important aspect of jewelry production at Love Your Diamonds.
That is why we are gradually converting our entire range to recycled precious metals. Recycled silver and gold offers the opportunity to wear precious jewelry while protecting the environment. This is because recycled precious metals are extracted from existing silver or gold stocks without the need to mine new raw materials.
This reduces our collective ecological footprint and hopefully leaves a little bit of a better future for your children. It is possible to offer high-quality and sustainable children's jewelry. We at Love Your Diamonds do this and want to offer you a conscious choice in favor of your children's health.
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Click here to see our child-friendly jewelry!