Wednesday 8 August 2012

THE very best way to clean silver jewellery




I've been re-arranging the Atelier jewellery cabinets to create space for some new pieces (I'll post a pic later in the week). Anyhoos it's always a good time to give some of the work a bit of a polish because we all know that silver does tend to tarnish as soon as it's exposed to air (baaah!). And when it comes to cleaning intricate pieces, such as Jemima Lumley's gorgeous daisy and love bird range, a buff up with a silver cloth can do more harm than good.


Don't worry there's a super easy - and chemical free - way of cleaning your silver just using ingredients that you have in your kitchen cupboards.


All you need is a bowl. Line it with kitchen foil and fill it with hand hot water. Add a good splash of bicarbonate of soda and a good splash of salt. Then all you have to do is pop your jewellery in the bowl, move it around a little bit and you can actually see it clean up before your very eyes - you even get wee whiff of a sulphery smell as the oxide is drawn from the silver to the foil. Leave it in there for a couple of minutes - or slightly longer if it's very tarnished - and then fish it out, rinse in a bowl fresh water and pop it onto a clean tea towel to dry. A weeny and very gentle buff with a silver polishing cloth if you feel it needs it and Ta Da your jewellery is as good as new.


Not a chemist so have no clue as to why or how it works. But it does as I use this to keep jewellery like Jemima's all sparkly in the cabinets. A word of warning however - this only works on precious metal don't try with work that has stones as the stones could be porous and end up being damaged by the salt.