Although many couples continue to choose traditional plain gold wedding rings, or perhaps gold wedding rings with added engraving or set with diamonds, the practice of selecting titanium wedding bands is growing.

Titanium was discovered just over two hundred years ago in Cornwall, England and it is widely used today for such things as surgical instruments, orthopedic and dental implant, bicycle frames and body piercing jewelry, to name just a few items. Silvery-white in color, titanium is light, strong and corrosion resistant. It also was an appealing and unusual lustrous quality.

On their own titanium wedding bands are often thought to be rather plain and so it is common for them to be inlaid with gold to produce two-tone rings. It is also increasingly common for titanium rings to be decorated with stones.

One practice is for couples to select their birthstones as suitable decoration, choosing just a single stone for their own birth month, a single stone for their partner’s birth month or a pair of stones combining both birth months. There is much debate about the subject of birthstones and not everybody is in agreement about which stone applies to which month. The list below is however generally accepted and is the list that was been adopted by the National Association of Goldsmiths in the United Kingdom:


January – Garnet (deep red)
February – Amethyst (deep purple)
March – Aquamarine (pale blue)
April – Diamond (clear)
May – Emerald (intense green)
June – Pearl (light cream)
July – Ruby (intense red)
August – Peridot (various shades of green)
September – Sapphire (blue, pink or yellow)
October – Opal (various colors)
November – Topaz (yellow)
December – Turquoise (light blue)

The problem with using birthstones in titanium wedding rings is that not all of the stones are suitable for use in a ring that is designed to be worn all of the time. Pearls and opals are, for example, considered to be too soft while amethysts, garnets and peridots are susceptible to cracking and can easily come loose from their settings when they are cut into small sizes.

As an alternative to using birthstones some couples pick their astrological stones instead. Again there is some disagreement over astrological stones, but one generally accepted list is as follows:


Aquarius – Onyx or Malachite
Pisces – Jasper or Jade
Aries - Carnelian
Taurus – Topaz or Citrine
Gemini – Emerald or green Feldspar
Cancer – Ruby or Garnet
Leo – Sapphire or Lapis Lazuli
Virgo – Diamond or Beryl
Libra – Cubic Zircon, Turquoise or Amber
Scorpio - Agate
Sagittarius - Amethyst
Capricorn – Peridot, light green Serpentine or Chalcedony

One of the great joys of getting married today is that the increasing departure from the traditional white wedding means that couples have very much more choice in just about every aspect of their wedding and can arrange their wedding very much to suit their own personalities and lifestyles. The adoption of titanium wedding bands is just one example of the changing face of weddings today.