{"id":101,"date":"2026-09-18T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/blog\/how-recycled-gold-is-cast\/"},"modified":"2026-10-13T11:56:38","modified_gmt":"2026-10-13T09:56:38","slug":"how-recycled-gold-is-cast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/blog\/how-recycled-gold-is-cast\/","title":{"rendered":"From scrap to solitaire: how we cast recycled gold"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>People often ask whether recycled gold is somehow lesser than newly mined gold. It is not. Gold is an element, and once it has been refined it has no memory of where it came from. A gram reclaimed from an old wedding band or a circuit board is chemically identical to a gram dug out of the ground last month. The difference is everything that did not have to happen to get it.<\/p>\n<h2>Where the gold comes from<\/h2>\n<p>Our gold is supplied as casting grain by a certified refinery that works only with reclaimed material: old jewellery, dental gold, and offcuts from the electronics and jewellery industries. The refinery melts these sources down, removes every other metal and brings the gold back to 999.9 fine. It is then alloyed again to the exact recipe we need.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>14k gold is 58.5% pure gold, alloyed with silver and copper for strength. We use it for hoops, chains and cuffs that need to hold their shape.<\/li>\n<li>18k gold is 75% pure gold, warmer in colour and a little softer. We use it for our solitaires and the Vela tennis bracelet, where the metal sits closest to the stones.<\/li>\n<li>Every alloy we order is documented by weight, so we can trace each batch back to its refinery certificate.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Step one: the wax<\/h2>\n<p>Each design begins as a model in hard jewellery wax. For a new piece, I carve the first model by hand with files and a small heated tool, checking proportions against the hand constantly. Once a design is right, we make a rubber mould from it, so we can inject identical waxes for every order without losing the hand-carved detail.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"bl-fig rv\">\n<div class=\"media\" data-ph=\"Image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/10\/mare-story.jpg\" alt=\"The Mar\u00e9 studio bench in soft morning light\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/div><figcaption>The casting corner of the studio on V\u00e6rnedamsvej, before the kiln is switched on.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>Step two: the tree and the flask<\/h2>\n<p>The waxes are attached by thin wax channels, called sprues, to a central wax trunk. The result looks like a small tree, which is exactly what goldsmiths call it. The tree is placed inside a steel flask and covered in a fine plaster called investment, which sets around every curve of every wax.<\/p>\n<p>The flask then goes into a kiln overnight. Over about twelve hours the temperature climbs slowly to around 730\u00b0C. The wax melts and burns away completely, leaving a perfect hollow in the plaster where each ring used to be. This is why the technique is called lost-wax casting: the original is always sacrificed.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"bl-quote rv\">\n<p>Lost-wax casting is thousands of years old. The only thing that has really changed is how carefully we can control the heat.<\/p>\n<footer><cite>Ida M\u00f8rk<\/cite><\/footer>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h2>Step three: the pour<\/h2>\n<p>We melt the recycled grain in a crucible to just above 1,000\u00b0C, then pour it into the hot flask under vacuum, which pulls the metal into the finest details before it can cool. A few minutes later the flask is quenched in water. The investment cracks away, and a tree of raw, matt gold rings is left behind.<\/p>\n<h2>Step four: the bench<\/h2>\n<p>This is where most of the time goes. Each piece is cut from the tree, the sprue mark is filed away, and the surface is sanded through finer and finer grits. Stones are then set by hand: for Aure, that means raising four claws around the diamond and shaping each one so it holds the stone securely while letting the most light in. Finally, each piece is polished on the wheel, cleaned, checked under magnification and stamped with its karat mark.<\/p>\n<p>Nothing is wasted. Filings, sprues and polishing dust are collected and sent back to the refinery, so the gold we do not use goes straight back into the loop.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every Mar\u00e9 ring starts as a carved piece of wax and a crucible of reclaimed gold. This is the full journey, step by step, from the refinery to your finger.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":41,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"nxt-post-page-sidebar":"","nxt-post-page-display-sidebar":"","nxt-post-page-custom-sidebar":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"mare_writer":[40],"class_list":["post-101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-craft","mare_writer-ida-moerk"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":258,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions\/258"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101"},{"taxonomy":"mare_writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.uichemy.com\/mare-jewellery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/mare_writer?post=101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}