Summer Jewelry Care

Let's Keep Your Jewelry Sparkling Through The Season.

Summer is around the corner, which means it's the season of sun, swimming, sweat, sand, and sunscreen. All these things make for a very enjoyable season, but our jewelry needs special attention, so here are some tips to keep your jewels in tip top shape.

Sunscreen:

I don't need to tell you how important it is to protect your skin, but I will tell you that it's so important to remove your jewelry before you put on your sunscreen to protect your jewelry. Waiting until your sunscreen dries helps reduce the amount of residue build up on your jewelry and if you've got soft/porous stones on like opals and turquoise, it reduces the chances of the chemicals in the sunscreen from harming them.

Swimming/Water Activities:

Not only is spending time in water with jewelry on the #1 reason for jewelry loss, but the chlorine in pool water, and salt in ocean water doesn't play well with gemstones and metals.

Chlorine is a corrosive, so it will eat away at your gold and silver making them weaker and prone to breaking overtime. Salt in saltwater can tarnish silver and the alloys in your solid karat weight gold. Both chlorine and salt can harm your softer, more porous gemstones as well.

If you forget to take it off, make sure to clean your jewelry with soap and water as soon as you can to reduce exposure time.

Sand:

Sand is strong and it gets everywhere! It's mainly made of quartz which ranks a 7 on the Mohs hardness scale. That means it will scratch your metal, and any gemstone that scores under 7 on the scale, like tanzanite, opal, or moonstone. It's just best to not expose your jewelry at all.

Sweat:

We can't really control for sweat, and no, it doesn't harm your jewelry. Buuuut the build up of residue does dull your jewelry's shine, so let's talk about cleaning. It's super simple. A warm bowl of water, some Dawn dish soap or non-harsh soap, and a baby toothbrush is all you need. Let your jewelry soak in the warm soapy water for a bit, then scrub with the brush, rinse, and dry. That's it!

If you have jewelry with a water sensitive stone, like an Ethiopian Opal, instead of soaking it in water, try wiping it down with a soft dry cloth. If the residue isn't budging, you can dampen the cloth for a little help. A microfiber cloth should do the trick!

Jewelry should be worn and enjoyed all year long so I hope these tips help!