One thing that keeps you going on buying jewellery one after another piece is its sparkling shine. Every time you buy a piece, you strive to keep it bright and shiny forever. While this job is not as easy as it seems, taking good care of your jewellery is worth it.
10 Easy Ways to Keep Your Jewellery at Its Shiny Best
Being a child, every girl loves to try her grandma’s and mumma’s vintage and antique jewellery. The old jewellery boxes were full of necklaces, brooches, fancy colourful hair clips, bracelets and rings. Our old ladies knew the tricks to keep their vintage jewellery bright and shiny at home. These tricks saved time, and money and kept their jewellery exactly the same as they bought it.
So, let’s just dig out some old tricks and some new ones to keep your jewellery alluring.
Keep Your Jewellery Away From Chemical
Earlier, jewellery was manufactured completely with bare hands. The use of chemicals was minimal. The women used to apply the natural ingredients to their bodies which had zero to minimum exposure with the jewellery. But, with the changing times, most of the products used by women for haircare and skincare comprise chemical composition. From hand wash to your face creams, every product contains harsh chemicals. The repetitive application of these harmful chemicals can damage your vintage jewellery over time. It’s necessary to remove jewellery before applying these products. You may not be able to notice the degradation at first, but slowly your jewellery will lose its lustre.
Store Your Jewellery Properly
Protecting your jewellery is one way of keeping it young and clean. The next step is to store your precious items properly. Your expensive jewellery needs a dedicated storage area for every piece you own. Not only that, every jewellery item is curated with different metals, gemstones, pressure and temperature. So, their storage types also vary. Some metals are prone to get oxidized while others may be fragile and need extra care while handling or storing. Scratches and marks are the most common damages that ruin your vintage jewellery. You need to research correctly about your jewellery and its special requirements to keep it safe and clean.
Using Ammonia
Ammonia has been used for decades for retaining the shine and lusture of the jewellery. Over the years it’s been used by people to brighten up their dull and dirty jewellery. Ammonia is supposed to work extraordinarily on diamonds. It’s easy to use the product at home. Warm water and a small amount of ammonia are enough to do all the magic. Just soak your jewellery in the mixture for about half an hour, then brush it up with your soft bristle toothbrush. The reaction will remove all the grime and dirt settled deep inside the crevices of your diamond jewellery. It retains all the lost sparkle of your precious stones. You can repeat this process every 4 months for the best results.
Use Beer for Plain Gold Jewellery
Gold jewellery is the best-seller despite its sky-rocket prices. Almost every jewellery lover has a collection of gold items in their treasure box. Gold jewellery is available in a variety of designs and styles. It may or may not contain any precious stones. Thus, every gold item needs to be cleaned accordingly. In the case of plain gold jewellery, beer can work miraculously. You just need to soak a clean dry cloth in beer and rub it over your plain gold jewellery piece, and within a few minutes, you will notice the difference. This trick is worth a try on antique and vintage gold jewellery too.
Use Ultrasound Cleaners Carefully
Ultrasound cleaners are invented to keep your jewellery clean by sending sound waves into the liquid. The vibrations remove the grime and dirt from your rings or other jewellery items. This technology seems the perfect solution for hustle free cleaning but it also comes with some side effects. These sound waves can loosen up the grip between any precious stone and metal. You must always check your jewellery thoroughly for any fixations for breakage previously. The ultrasound waves are capable of damaging these fixations easily.
Clean Your Jewellery Periodically
Even though you try every possible thing to keep your jewellery clean, it does lose its charm with time. Apart from using all the tricks stated above, the most important thing is to clean your jewellery at a fixed interval of time. Even if you haven’t used it for a longer period, it still needs to get cleaned. Humidity, air pressures and other climatic conditions also react with metals and degrade their quality. It’s better to take care of your jewellery every 4 or 6 months if not used frequently. While everyday jewellery needs to be cleaned every month.
Save Silica Gel Packs
You must have always noticed a small package of silica gel pearls inside brand new shoes, bags, purses etc. These tiny balls are highly effective in keeping these products moisture-free. You can use the same for protecting your jewellery from moisture and oxidation.
Handle Your Jewellery Sparingly
As discussed earlier, every metal and jewellery material requires a different set of tricks to protect it against any supposed damage. Your diamond, gold, silver, and platinum jewellery needs to be handled and stored separately. You must store similar kinds of jewellery together while storing it separately from other jewellery items.
When In Hurry, Use Baking Soda
Baking soda is a common ingredient that is easily available in every household. This chemical composition works amazingly in collaboration with aluminium. This simple trick requires you to line a glass bowl with aluminium foil, pour some baking soda along with a gentle dish cleanser, a pinch of salt and a small amount of water. After a minute add your metal jewellery to this solution and leave it for about 20 minutes. You will be astonished to get the gleam back. This component works on almost every metal, just avoid cleaning your artificial jewellery and plated jewellery with this composition. It can tarnish your jewellery.
Know-How to Clean Your Jewellery
Before making any hasty picks, always research deeply about all the concerns associated with your particular jewellery item. While cleaning your jewellery at home, always use gentle products. Use a clean dry cloth to avoid any marks or scratches. While cleaning vintage jewellery you need to be extra careful. Once you learn the process completely, it won’t be a big deal for you the next time.