Tips for Preserving Antiques

By Melinda L. Wilson
Certified Appraiser and Consultant

Preserving the Beauty of Your Silver

Need to clean your silver? Does it have a design on it or your monograms? If so, NEVER dip it or use strong silver cleaner. Those "designs/pattern" on the piece over the years stand out more in appearance due to the oxidation of the piece. That means, the air getting to it and causing it to darken. This takes years to be done and you can wipe it out by dipping or pouring a cleaner over it. Plus, many of those cleaners are toxic to breath. I know it is not fun to clean your silver, but use a gentle paste material or, the one I love, "Nevr Dull", that you can get at the hardware store or grocery store. It's a cotton cloth that you can tear pieces off and use over and over again not matter how black the cloth gets. Once you have rubbed it on, you then want to wash it off with, again, a mild soap and water and then towel dry. You don't want to rub too hard on the "designs" (just enough to clean it), then that pattern will stay and stand out more on your piece making it much more attractive. You can save tons of money this way and have beautiful silver when you want to use it. And REMEMBER, make sure it is good and dry before putting up and to put it in that Cheap "Pacific Cloth" I talked about earlier!

File Under:

Cleaning Silver
Appraising Silver
Preserving Silver