care and maintenance

It's good practice to bring your jewelry in to see a goldsmith about every 6 months; more if you know you're mean to your bling. Reason being that unless you have a 10 power microscope at home and an ultrasonic machine, you don't really know their condition. When people bring their things to me to look at and I discover that they have loose stones, They always ask, "Why?". The answer is never simple because it could be any number of things, so I rattle off a few of these questions to see if any of them ring true.
Do you sleep in them?
Do you wear them while doing housework?
Do you wear them while gardening?
Do you wear them in the shower or swimming pool?
Do you wear them while working out?
How often do you wear them, and for how long?
These questions will usually spark a deeper conversation once any of them hit home.
I'm not sure when this misconception popped up, buy I want to meet the person that started it. Jewelry (rings in particular) are not made to be worn all day every day. I think that wedding rings are the ones most damaged by this rumor.
Jewelry (if it isn't costume) is made from precious metals, the definition of which is a metal that falls under the gold, silver, or platinum group. You might not think so, but all of those metals are soft. They wear, bend, and break if not properly taken care of. That coupled with the fact that some of the jewelry being produced today isn't being constructed with a longevity as a priority. That statement falls under," Know what you're buying" category as well as "Care and maintenance", and I'll go deeper into that at another time.
Jewelry is made to be an adornment, not an organ necessary to your survival. Your wedding ring is a symbol, it is not your marriage itself. Taking it off doesn't mean there's trouble in paradise and it doesn't mean you don't love each other any more. It holds strong emotional influence, I know. But let's not go overboard with the sentiment. You can't confuse the strength of the metal with the strength of the memory of when you got it.
I said earlier that jewelry isn't made to be worn all day every day. I ask you, where did that idea come from? Did the salesperson say thay it could? "Well nobody ever told me that it would break!" That may be true. But there is a certain amount of common sense and responsibility we assume people have when they spend thousands of dollars on something they intend to wear. If you think about it, jewelry isn't so different from say, a Chanel blouse, or a Dior purse. The names give them prestige in our mind. We associate them with words like Quality and High end. But are you going to wear that Chanel blouse all day and all night, even while sleeping? Are you going to keep that Dior purse on the floor of your car when driving, or throw it in the closet at the end of the day? The answer is no, because even though they are well made pieces from giants of the Fashion industry, we know that they are not indestructable. They weren't cheap, and we want them to last.
Why is jewelry so different?
Sheets act like sandpaper over time to prongs on your ring, and sleeping in necklaces is an easy way to stretch the chain to the point of no repair.
Chlorine eats at gold and will dinge the rhodium that makes white gold white. It especially will do damage to silver if you happen to be wearing it when you take a dip. Thay being said, hot springs are a definite no no as well.
Why on earth would you wear rings while mixing raw meat for hamburger patties? Take them off!
Toothpaste is for cleaning your teeth, nothing else. The people at Crest didn't formulate their paste to clean jewelry and later discover that it happened to help with fighting gingivitis as well. Toothpaste is abrasive and scratches precious metals. While it may look cleaner after you use it, you are in fact doing damage. Take it to a professional. We have specially formulated cleaners for this job, and while they may not leave a minty aroma, they are in fact better suited for the job.
Housework calls for moving things around, scrubbing, washing, and general cleaning. That's a lot of potential to knock your rings around and expose them to various chemicals that likely don't associate well with precious metals.
It's important that you as the owner do everything you can to ensure your jewelry stands the test of time. We as goldsmiths are there to assist you in that endeavor. We are not solely responsible. There you have it, the basic Dos and don'ts of jewelry.
If you have a question and I didn't touch on it on any of my posts thus far, please comment. I Am more than happy to reply.