Now, I most certainly am not an advocate of the “free cleaning service” which I do not offer and for good reason. Firstly, before any piece of jewellery is professionally cleaned it must be fully checked by a gemstone setter to make sure that it is suitable for professional cleaning. By “professional cleaning” I mean that the piece of jewellery maybe filed (to remove deep scratches) polished a number of times with various polishes (to remove scratches) and put into a very strong ultrasonic machine to remove all the dirt and polish from the jewellery. The ultrasonic waves in this machine are very strong and really vibrate the jewellery (as I found out when I once put my finger in it). The settings of all gemstones have to be very strong and secure to be able to hold the stones in place. After a piece of jewellery has been professionally cleaned it has to be rechecked by the gemstone setter to make sure that all the gemstones are still very secure and all tightened if necessary. I have many customers coming in to me telling me that a diamond has just fallen out of their ring and when I question them about what they had done with the ring I usually get a reply like “well I only had it cleaned last week you know with one of those jewellers that offer a free cleaning but I can’t remember doing anything else with it”. So, there is the answer most of the shops that offer on the spot free cleaning do not have setters checking the jewellery before and after cleaning. They just swish the jewellery around in the ultrasonic cleaner for a few minutes and hand it back to the customer. Now of course it will look amazing, clean and wonderful but are all the gemstones secure?. I would strongly advise customers not to opt for the “free cleaning” unless of course the jewellery is going to be fully checked by a qualified gemstone setter before and after cleaning. This especially applies to “micro set” rings these are rings that are set with very tiny diamonds that usually only have one or two grains of thin metal holding them in place.
If you want your diamond to shine then you can very easily do this yourself by using warm water, fairy liquid and a baby paint brush (not a tooth brush). You gently submerge diamond jewellery in the warm water with the fairy liquid swish around and clean the back of the diamonds with the baby paint brush. You then dry the jewellery with acid free paper or a sort cloth used to clean “eye glasses”. Do not do this technique with pearls, opals, emeralds, porous or soft stones. You can always check with me if you require any advice about what stones are suitable for this technique.
