Cleaning Your Jewelry and Gemstone
After buying your jewelry the most important thing to protect your investment is to learn how to clean and take care of them. Here are a few tips:
- You should store all your gemstone jewelry separate from each other. Remember that harder stones can scratch softer ones and even the metal.
- Every single gemstone, including a diamond, can break. You should take them off before you get into a challenging activity. Also, don’t ever remove the rings by pulling the stone, since you can loosen it up.
- Rings get dirty very easily especially if you wear them on a regular basis, like engagement rings. You should clean them all the time. The best way to clean most transparent gemstones is to soak them in water with just a little dish soap in a small bowl. Rinse the soap off and dry with a lint-free cloth. If you want to add shine to your platinum or gold jewelry with a diamond, sapphire or ruby stone, you can add a tiny bit of ammonia in the rinse water. But don’t try this with organic or opaque gemstones.
- Organic gemstones are soft and porous. Examples are pearls, corals and amber. You should only wipe them with a moist cloth. Chemicals can hurt them, like hairspray or perfume. Also ammonia harms these gems.
- Opaque gemstones are actually rocks, so they need special treatment. Examples are turquoise, malachite and lapis. You should wipe clean these with a moist cloth as well. Never use any chemicals, even soap since these can discolor the stone. Don’t use ammonia either.
By following these few guidelines you can have great looking jewelry for many years to come.
