Ohio-Cincinnati

Silver jewelry cleaning tip

This may be totally irrelevant to many of you, but it was a big help to me so I thought I'd share.  I bought my BMs' sterling silver & smoky quartz jewelry a really long time ago (ok, before I was even engaged!) and it has gotten really tarnished (I should have kept it in plastic zip lock bags).  I was worried about using a silver cleaner becuase of the quartz stones, but found the coolest method online that works.  Place the jewlery in an aluminum pan (like a disposable pie pan from the grocery store), cover all the silver with baking soda, and then pour boiling water on.  Some chemical reaction occurs which gets the silver sparkly clean (and didn't damage the stones).  Was a big help to me, thought I'd pass it along!

Re: Silver jewelry cleaning tip

  • skippylouwhoskippylouwho member
    1000 Comments
    edited December 2011
    How long did you let the jewelry sit in the boiling water/baking soda mix?
  • abromanelloabromanello member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    Probably 30-60 seconds.  If the first treatment doesn't get it all the way clean, you should do it all over again, since it's not the soaking that gets it clean but the chemical reaction that occurs when the boiling water hits the baking soda/aluminum/silver.  I did two treatments each for my pieces.
  • edited December 2011
    My mom has done this with flatware and it works.  : ) I've never tried it with jewelry, though. I don't know why not.
  • edited December 2011
    I second this, have used this same method on a silver serving plate and it works beautifully!
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