Your silverware or other silver items are special to you, whether they were given to you or you carefully picked them out yourself. Therefore, it’s essential to know how to properly clean and polish your silver because even silver that is carefully stored will become tarnished and need to be cleaned.
You won’t need to clean or polish your silver very often, but it is something you should learn to do. It will allow you to display your silver or just have it look nice when you want to use it. Some items may look fine with just a quick polish using a microfiber cloth. However, fine silver may require a bit more work.
Cleaning Tarnished Silver
Tarnish isn’t easy to remove. It can take a lot of work. But it’s important to be careful as well. Whenever you clean your silver, you are removing a bit of silver, and you don’t want to remove more than necessary. If the items you are cleaning are silver-plated, you could actually destroy them in the cleaning process if you are not careful.
Now it’s time to clean the silver. To start cleaning the silver, you just need a microfiber cloth and silver cleaner or polish. Before you start cleaning the silver, you should dust it. If you clean the silver before dusting it, the dust could scratch the silver.
If you don’t have silver cleaner or polish, there are some alternatives you could use, and you probably have some of these around the house. Here are a few.
Lemon Juice and Salt
Lemon juice and bath salt is an effective way to clean silver. Just mix a cup of lemon juice and a half cup of bath salt and soak your silver in it for about ten minutes. Then, rinse the silver with water and dry and polish it with a microfiber cloth.
Baking Soda and Vinegar
Baking soda and vinegar can be used as a natural way to clean your silverware. It will clean the silverware and disinfect and deodorize it. To clean and polish your silverware with baking soda and vinegar, pour a cup of distilled white vinegar into a glass bowl and slowly add four tablespoons of baking soda to it. Then, add the silverware to the bowl and let it soak for about three hours. Next, rinse the silverware with warm water and dry and polish it with a microfiber cloth.
Toothpaste
Toothpaste isn’t a very good silver cleaner, but it can work as a polish. Although, you will want to be gentle when using it for sterling silver or plated silver items to avoid damaging them. This method is actually best for matte or satin silver items. To polish your silver items, put a small amount of toothpaste on a damp microfiber cloth and then gently polish your silver items with it. After polishing your items, rinse them with warm water and then dry and polish them with a microfiber cloth.
Final Thoughts
There are many ways to clean and polish silver. You can just buy some cleaner at the store and use it, or for people who are eco-conscious or want to save some money, there are many do-it-yourself solutions. Whatever method you choose, it is important to care for your silver if you want it to remain in good condition and retain its value and beauty for years to come.
Contact Us
For cleaning and appraisal of fine silver and other decorative objects, contact Manzi Appraisers & Restorers. Our team has over 20 years of experience providing individuals and businesses with accurate valuation restorations. Call us at 617-995-0022 and connect with us on Facebook.
