Body Jewelry can be found anywhere from your local gym store to a large online shop. But finding high-quality body jewelry is not so easy. If you are a beginner and have not much experience, then it can be difficult to tell apart a high-quality piece from a low-grade piece of junk.
It is important to choose the right piece as it goes right through your skin. The materials used can highly affect your health and can lead to numerous issues. There are no official certifications either to mark jewelry safe or to grade the quality. It all comes down to experience. You will have to be wary.
But we are here and would help you find the best and highest quality body jewelry in the market. Here are the 6 essential steps.
Always Use Sterilized Jewelry
Body jewelry directly contacts your skin, which increases the chance of infection and allergy. A high-quality piece will always be sterilized to remove any chemical residue. Do not purchase a piece of jewelry from any store that carries unsterilized products.
Most body jewelry shops will provide sterilization services. It would help if you considered them when you are going to use a piece after a while.
Do NOT Consider Plated Body Jewelry
Many manufacturers use plating to add some depth to the jewelry colors. Plated jewelry comes in a wide variety of colors and designs. This may look fancy but try to avoid them. The plating is not surgical or implant grade, and over time, they degrade, making them extremely prone to infections and skin leakage.
You can try the expensive plated body jewelry for short periods, but at all costs, don’t consider Nickel-plated stuff. Most of the plated parts use low-grade nickel, which is toxic and causes allergies.
Mixed Metal Jewelry is NOT Good
Most shops carry budget jewelry options that have some form of metal mixed with it. They are not pure and used to lower down the production costs. But this also means the lowering of health standards.
Unlike pure materials like gold, implant grade Steel, or titanium, most of these mixed metal parts don’t have the high quality and safety grading. They don’t come with any certifications, either.
External Threaded Jewelry should be avoided.
External threads are commonly found in low-cost parts. It would help if you stayed away from them as they can cause inflammation, infections and leave scar marks when regularly used, especially when your piercing wound is still fresh.
Internally threaded jewelry pieces like ear cartilage jewelry are usually high quality and safer to use. They are also great if you are regularly changing your look and try out different options. They also have a tighter thread, which makes sure they don’t come out that easily.
Polished to a Mirror Finish
High-quality body jewelry almost has a mirror finish to it. Not only do these pieces look good, but they are also healthy too. The fine polishing work removes all kinds of microscopic imperfections which can catch dead skins and oil. This eliminates any chances of odor and infections. A rough and imperfect piece is only inviting problems down the road.
Certified Body Jewelry
Technically, no institution officially certifies body jewelry. But the materials and metals are graded before being converted into designer pieces. Don’t trust what is written on paper and actually ask your local piercers to guide you.
Surgical steel, Aircraft Grade, Molten Glass are marketing buzzwords and have no actual meaning for body jewelry. You should ask for implant grade materials or, in the case of Gold, at least pure 18K. Implant grade implies that the product is safe for internal human tissue and free of any infection-causing chemicals.
