All About Gold

Written By Allie Perry March 21, 2025

Gold has been prized across civilizations for thousands of years for its beauty, rarity, and versatility. Whether adorning the royalty that hoarded it, serving as currency, or being used for religious idols, burial masks, or tombs, gold has maintained its value throughout history. But what makes gold so unique? 

Gold Properties

Gold (chemical symbol Au) is a dense, non-reactive metal with a bright yellow luster. It’s one of the least chemically reactive elements, which means it doesn’t tarnish or corrode over time.  That’s why when you go visit the Met or the Louvre, the golden antiquities on display look as stunning today as the day they were made. It’s also why gold is ideal for use in jewelry and coins, since it retains its shine and integrity for centuries.

Gold is also highly conductive, making it valuable in electronics. But one of its most remarkable properties is its extreme malleability and ductility. 

Malleability refers to the ability of a material to be hammered or pressed out of shape without breaking or cracking. A single gram of gold, an amount smaller than the size of your pinky nail, is so malleable it can be beaten into a sheet measuring just under eleven square feet! That means mathematically a little brick of gold the size of a matchbox can be hammered out to cover the surface area of sixteen tennis courts! 

Ductility is the ability of a metal to be drawn (pulled) into very thin strands without losing toughness. It stays pliable without becoming brittle, so it can be drawn into ultra-thin wires without breaking.

So it’s pretty to look at *and* it’s super cool, scientifically, but it’s not perfect for every application because it’s a very soft metal.

Why Is Gold So Soft?

Because of its atomic structure! Unlike many metals, gold has weak metallic bonding, meaning its atoms can easily slide past one another under pressure. And while those easily sliding atoms are great for malleability, it also means pure 24 karat gold is really impractical for everyday wear. Jewelry made from pure gold would bend, scratch, and deform far too easily. So how do we fix that?

Alloys and Gold

Since gold is so soft, it’s almost always alloyed with other metals to increase its durability. Mixing gold with metals like copper, silver, nickel, and palladium enhances its strength while allowing for a variety of colors:

• Yellow Gold: Mixed with silver and copper to maintain a rich golden hue while improving hardness. The higher the gold content, the richer the yellow color. This is why 18k gold with its 75% purity has a much richer yellow tone than 14k gold an its 58.5% purity.
• Rose Gold: Contains a higher proportion of copper, giving it a warm, pinkish tint.
• White Gold: Made by alloying gold with metals like palladium, nickel, or platinum to create a silvery appearance.

The Truth About White Gold

I tell people all the time that white gold doesn’t exist…naturally. In its pure form, gold is always yellow. The “white” color comes from the metals added to the alloy, which dilute the yellow tone and give the metal the appearance of being white. However, even with these alloys, white gold often has a slightly yellowish hue. To achieve the bright white finish you may have come to expect from white gold jewelry, it’s typically plated with rhodium, a naturally occurring white metal. Over time, this plating wears off though, revealing the underlying color, which is why white gold jewelry occasionally needs to be re-plated.

The same thing goes for rose gold, or green gold, and any other fancy colored gold like blue or purple. Yes, purple! None of it exists in nature, and the changes that alloys create when mixed with gold aren’t always good. For example, purple gold is super NOT malleable, and may shatter on impact or screw up your electronics. That’s how it earned the nickname “purple plague.”

So now we know pure gold is always yellow, but where does it come from and how do we get it?

How Gold Is Mined

Gold in the Earth’s crust is mined through several methods, including:

• Placer Mining: Extracting gold from riverbeds and streams where it has eroded from its original source. Think old-school gold rush, panning and sifting through riverbeds to find the smaller bits of gold that have washed down from larger deposits.
• Hard Rock Mining: Extracting gold from underground veins of quartz rock, often requiring complex excavation and chemical processing. This process is what you probably imagine when you hear about gold mining. It’s complex and expensive, but it can have a high yield.
• Heap Leaching: Using cyanide or other chemicals to dissolve gold from ore, then recovering it through refining processes. Literally leaching gold from a heap of crushed rock.

Modern gold mining is an extensive industry that spans across continents, from deep African mines to North American operations.

Despite the expansiveness of the industry, and the fact that gold has been extracted from the ground for thousands of years, if you took all of the gold ever mined on Earth and put it in one big pile, it would fit into about 3.5 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

Does Gold Retain Its Value?

Yes! Gold’s enduring value is due to several key factors:

• Scarcity: Gold is rare, tough to find, and difficult to extract. But it’s also pretty and everyone wants it. So the limited supply and high demand help gold keep its value.
• Durability: Unlike many commodities, gold does not degrade, rust, or corrode.
• Cultural and Historical Significance: Used for millennia in jewelry, art, and currency, gold has consistently been valued by many cultures.
• Economic Stability: Gold is often seen as a “safe haven” asset during financial crises, preserving its purchasing power over time.

Gold’s unique properties, from its softness and malleability to its resistance to corrosion, make it one of the most remarkable metals on Earth. While pure gold is too soft for everyday jewelry, alloying it with other metals enhances its strength and allows for a variety of colors—including the ever-popular white gold. Whether you wear it, invest it, or just admire it, gold will always be a symbol of wealth, beauty, and stability.

If you’re ready to add some handmade gold jewelry to your collection, head over to Allie Perry Designs to see what I made for you!