Total environmental resilience is essential for versatile, everyday wear. This feature ensures that jewelry and accessories can be fully submerged in water without suffering from tarnishing, plating loss, or base-metal degradation, providing a benchmark for high-performance functionality.
The Science of Immersion Resistance
In the jewelry industry, waterproof performance is the measure of a material's "hydrophobic" and "anti-corrosive" properties. Unlike water-resistant items, which can only handle light splashes, waterproof jewelry is engineered to withstand prolonged exposure to fresh water, chlorinated pool water, and saltwater. This is typically achieved through the use of non-reactive base metals like Grade 316L Surgical Steel or Titanium, combined with Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) coating. In the PVD process, a decorative layer (such as 18K gold) is bonded to the base metal at a molecular level within a vacuum. This creates a finish that is ten times thicker and significantly harder than traditional electroplating, ensuring the gold "skin" never peels or flakes off even when submerged.
Validation through the High Performance Mark
By meeting selected technical benchmarks, your jewelry products become eligible for the Intertek High Performance (HP) Mark’s Waterproof. For the Waterproof claim, we apply EN 13138-1 section 5.7.2 - Resistance to pool water. Samples are submerged in an agitated chlorine solution for 12 hours. The samples must display no sign of degradation or surface damage to meet our requirement.
This mark serves as a ‘proof of performance’ by validating that your product meets the HP Mark standards. You can display the mark on product tags, brochures, packaging, websites, and in both online and offline stores across multiple channels, confidently signal to consumers that the performance claims of your products are verified.
