Caring for and cleaning your solid gold jewellery

Keep your Laura Bond jewellery looking beautiful by following the care tips below.

Caring for solid gold jewellery

Solid gold is a soft metal and if not handled delicately can be bent very easily.

If you are having trouble fitting your earrings in your cartilage piercings (like the daith or tragus) we would always recommend visiting your local piercer where they can fit the jewellery for you.

Can solid gold jewellery tarnish?

Gold is one of the least reactive chemical elements. Pure gold does not combine easily with oxygen so it stays shiny and it does not rust or tarnish.

Pure gold or 24 karat gold is much too soft to be used in jewellery so it is usually alloyed with other base metals altering its properties to make it stronger. These metals alloyed with gold may react with oxygen, chemicals and moisture which can tarnish your solid gold jewellery.

The effect is not permanent and gold can be cleaned and polished back to its original glory with some simple cleaning techniques.

This can happen if you leave your earrings in 24/7 and shower, exercise or swim with them in.

Influences that may also contribute to tarnishing solid gold jewellery are the consistent exposure to high amounts of chemicals in perfume, hairspray, deodorants and cleaning products like chlorine and detergents.

Some people's natural body oils are also more likely to tarnish solid gold than others.

How should I clean my solid gold jewellery?

Here’s our simple way to keep your jewellery sparkly and lustrous.

You’ll need:

A watertight container - a shallow tub or bowl is best

Some aluminium foil

A kettle to boil the water

A couple of tea spoons of bicarbonate of soda

Method:

1. Take your tub and line it with the aluminium foil - making sure the shiny side of the foil is facing upwards.

2. Place your jewellery in the tub making sure it’s touching the foil.

3. Pour boiling water over the jewellery, making sure it’s covered.

4. Add the bicarbonate of soda/baking powder - roughly 2 tbsp per litre of boiling water.

5. Let it bubble and fizz - you might start to see the tarnish lift and the beautiful lustre below shine through.

6. If the piece is badly tarnished you may need to repeat the process a few times.

7. Wait 10 minutes then remove the jewellery from the tub using a spoon to avoid burning yourself.

8. Pat the jewellery dry with some paper kitchen towel.

You can also use an anti-tarnish jewellery polishing cloth to buff and polish your solid gold earrings.

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