To keep your hand-crafted jewelry clean and in good condition, gently wipe off residues and oils with a soft, 100% cotton lint-free cloth. Apply perfumes, make-up, hairspray or other products prior to putting on jewelry to prevent damage to softer stones and build-up on your jewelry. Clean your jewelry using a soft bristled toothbrush and a drop of dishwashing liquid or hand soap. (Never use toothpaste or other abrasive cleaners as they may scratch metals.) Be sure to rinse and dry thoroughly prior to re-storing.
Tarnish Prevention and Storage Tips
Store each piece individually to prevent soft stones, pearls, sea shells and metals from being scratched by harder stones or other pieces of jewelry. Store your jewelry laid flat or hung up to deter kinks and knots. To help prevent sterling silver from tarnishing (also when traveling), put your jewelry in a plastic "ziploc" bag within a soft bag or in an air-tight container. If your jewelry is made with tiger tail (a nylon-coated steel wire), do not scrunch it up. Tiger tail has "memory", so if it bends, it stays that way. To store, lay it flat, or hang naturally and it will keep its shape forever. Paper and resin jewelry should not be exposed to heat and sun and should be stored separately as it could get scratched by other jewelry.
Cleaning Instructions
When your jewelry begins to tarnish or become heavily soiled, you may soak it in warm water with a mild liquid soap for 2-3 minutes. Rinse thoroughly and allow your jewelry to dry completely on a lint-free cloth before re-storing it in your bags.
Be very careful when using any soaking method to clean jewelry that has soft stones (amber, azurite, calcite, chrysocolla, fluorite, lapis lazuli, malachite, pearls, rhodochrosite, sodalite and turquoise are all soft stones which should be cleaned with care). Extended soaking in any solution may harm the polish on the stone. With these soft stones it is preferable to simply wipe them down with a little soapy water rather than soaking them. Because they are very porous they absorb liquid and can become discolored by any chemicals - even soap. Pearls are especially sensitive to acidity and humidity. It is recommended that you wrap pearl pieces in jeweler’s tissue and store directly in a soft bag as moisture can build up in a plastic bag and damage the pearls.
Tarnish Removal
To remove excessive tarnish from sterling silver, use a jeweler’s cloth. Because some of Verena's jewelry designs incorporate the use of patina to achieve different colors on metals, an aggressive metal cleaner may do the job too well, removing the patina and changing the overall appearance of the piece.
Special Care and Consideration
Soft stones (see above) and sea shells are very brittle and crack easily. They should be worn with care and stored carefully.
Remove jewelry pieces that contain soft stones, sea shells or pearls if you are doing activities that require them to be submerged in liquid for any length of time (i.e. doing dishes, bathing, swimming, etc.). Always remove your jewelry before using any product that contains bleach or chlorine. These chemicals can cause gold and other metals to break down as well as discolor and damage softer stones.
With a little care and the cleaning methods described above, your hand-crafted jewelry will maintain its original beauty throughout the years.
