A week or so back, I had an email from a customer overseas, asking how to clean her little Africa pendant she had purchased from me. I sent quite a detailed response, and was thinking it’s something I should share with everyone 🙂
For cleaning silver jewellery, I use a product called Silvo, which is a silver polish, to clean my pieces if necessary.. You get it at the supermarket here in South Africa – it’s the same stuff your mom probably uses to clean silver cutlery! I’m sure there must be equivalents to this in different parts of the world! 😉
Basically, you just shake the tin, then pour a tiny amount on a soft cotton cloth, then rub the piece gently over it – then use a clean part of the cloth to rub the polish off 🙂 You’ll see the cloth go black when you rub the piece!
I do use a small amount of a metal called Indium in my alloying process, which helps retard the tarnishing process for a while, but if you’re slightly acidic, or live near the sea (like me in both cases!), the silver will eventually blacken..
If there is still some polish left on the edges – another nice cleaning trick is to pop it into a container of just boiled water, then add dishwashing liquid soap, and a tiny amount of ammonia. Then use a soft toothbrush to clean.
This is also great for rings (and gold jewellery) etc – especially with diamonds & other stones, where dirt gets trapped under the stones – you’ll see how shiny they come up!!
You can also use Silvo & a cloth to clean chains – but another nice tip is to put a little bit of washing powder & water into your cupped hand, and to rub the chain in your hands, this can also help clean it..
These are things that can help on a daily basis, just to clean your jewellery a little – but I’ll be 100% honest – there’s nothing for the home market that works as well as what’s in a jeweller’s studio! If you want your jewellery to look like new – take it to a local jeweller, and ask for a clean & polish.. Chains will be tumbled, and solid pieces polished by hand, and they will once again look like new! (This shouldn’t be expensive, but might be worth a small outlay, especially if you want to wear something for a special occasion!) 🙂
Anyhow – hope this little bit of information has helped! Have a fantastic day everyone 🙂 Megs xx
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I found that if I sprinkled some Barkeepers Friend in the sink, dipped a wet toothbrush in it, and then just dabbed-NEVER BRUSHED-the toothbrush on the item, the tarnish would be gone in seconds. I then rinsed the item in cool water and dried it immediately (or spots would remain). I now use this method on copper, bronze, and brass jewelry with great results. By not brushing, the metal finish remains shiny instead of brushed. Oh, and this also gets me a clean sink more often!
I have a beautiful silver necklace but it is getting so dark that I can’t wear it anymore. Thanks a lot for sharing this easy and cheap method for making my necklace looks like a new one. Thanks!
This looks great! Someone recently told me to polish an old silver plated mirror I have with tooth paste! Supposedly this is supposed to clean silver too.
Manor Park Carpet Cleaners Ltd.
I have beautiful silver earrings which I can’t wear any more because they are dark and looks like they are old and dirty. Thanks a lot for this nice article!Chislehurst Carpet Cleaners Ltd.
So interesting article! I can’t wear my silver necklace because it looks awful! I will try this method of cleaning my silver! Thank you for the information!Colindale Carpet Cleaners Ltd.
I have heard of this product from my best friend who lives is South Africa. She cleans all of her jewellery with this magical substance. I will write to her if she could send me a bottle of it. Thank you for the interesting post!
I tried cleaning my two silver chains with a little washing powder in my hand and a touch of warm water and they came up stunning! Thank you! 🙂