Examples of gold frames for U.S. and foreign issued awards

A Gold frame is a military decoration which is issued by most of the world’s militaries as an attachment to certain awards and decorations. The gold frame is designed to enclose an award ribbon and is usually a means of distinguishing the ribbon’s special quality or denoting some additional achievement to the award's basic criteria.

In countries which issue the Presidential Unit Citation, the gold frame is almost always used as a standard device to denote such awards. Some countries also use the gold frame as a method of differentiating unit awards from regular decorations. Such is the case in the United States Army, which issues all unit citations with the gold frame.

The gold frame is normally an automatic attachment to a ribbon decoration. In certain cases, however, awards may be issued both with and without the gold frame depending upon the level of achievement. Such is the case in the United States Air Force which issues the gold frame to the Air Force Expeditionary Service Ribbon only when the decoration was presented under combat conditions.

The gold frame is a device for ribbon awards only, and there are no provisions for issuing the attachment for medals. Gold frames are also a one time decoration, as there are obviously no means of denoting multiple gold frames on a single award ribbon.