Many manly fingers are sporting engagement rings
By Olivia Barker
USA TODAY
When it comes to getting down on bended knee, men traditionally have been the lords of the ring.
But in a gold-and-platinum twist on altar etiquette, women also are presenting their husbands-to-be with rings -- months before they've even thought about the caterer.
Engagement rings are increasingly encircling men's fingers. Simple or intricate, yellow or white, diamond-embedded or birthstone-encrusted, the bands are yet another example of how modern couples are calling the shots as they plan their nuptials. (Typically, the future groom might receive a watch or a pair of cuff links, if he were lucky, in exchange for ponying up two months' salary for a solitaire for his intended.)
An engagement-ring swap carries ''a lovely sentiment of giving and promise,'' says Bride's editor in chief Millie Martini Bratten. Others aren't so convinced. Deborah Moses, Elegant Bride editor in chief, says it sounds a little bit like trading high school class rings, ''but maybe I'm a classicist.''
In fact, men's engagement rings are standard in other countries -- from socially liberal Sweden, where sexual equality is paramount, to mostly Muslim Syria, where it's shameful for a betrothed man to go without for fear he might stray from his beloved.
Eva Kilnisan has been doing brisk business in masculine engagement rings for the past couple of years through her Hoboken, N.J., company, Traders of Babylon. As men become more accustomed to wearing jewelry in general, ''they want something, too,'' she reasons. ''We are equal now, right?''
Australian-based Gillett's Jewellers boasts 30-plus styles of men's engagement rings, which account for about 5% of the jeweler's online sales. Gillett's conducts half of its transactions over the Internet, largely with Americans.
Jenny Libien's then-boyfriend popped the question a few years ago on Valentine's Day, when nearly 10% of all proposals occur, according to a recent Bride's survey. Right away, she wanted to reciprocate. ''I'm a feminist and, well, we were getting engaged,'' says Libien, 32, a pathology resident from Dobbs Ferry, N.Y. ''It wasn't just me.''
So while vacationing in San Francisco a month later, she spied the perfect token of her affection at a sidewalk vendor's booth -- a sterling silver band for 10 bucks. ''I called it his training ring,'' Libien says. Her fiancé, computer scientist Richard Goodwin, 39, needed a little encouragement before sliding it on his wedding-ring finger. The band promptly confused his friends and family, who were sure the two had eloped.
A year later, the night before the ceremony, Goodwin pulled off his practice ring. (It resides in his bedside table.) The process made graduating from silver to platinum ''so easy,'' Libien says.
Other men slip their engagement rings on their left hand and double them up with a wedding band after saying ''I do.'' Still others adorn their right third finger with the bands, some symbolically switching them to their left hand during the ceremony.
And what if the couple calls off the engagement? The etiquette is the same as with her ring. ''It depends on who does the breaking up,'' Bratten says. If he does the deed, he gives his ring back. But if she gets cold feet, he gets to keep the ring, as a kind of consolation prize.
