Gold (Au)
Gold has to be one of the most significant materials in history, both culturally and economically. A malleable and dense material that, together with copper, silver, lead, tin, iron and mercury, was alone in the known metals family for 7,700 years. Without exception, it is the only metal in the metals family that is chemically stable, all the others react with oxygen and other elements to corrode.
Gold has never really been an industrial designer’s material. Naturally, jewellery designers use gold all the time, but outside of jewellery any reference to gold in design can be seen as intentionally kitsch or perhaps seen as overdoing it slightly. As a benchmark of value and luxury and a status symbol, gold is unique in the sense that it ...
Get Materials for Design now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
