Cleaning your gemstone jewelry doesn’t require any special appliances but it has to be cared properly. Simply a bowl of water with little amount of detergent can do wonder. To clean the stone, you need a soft toothbrush but don’t scrub too hard as this could scratch the stone.
Try to gently wipe off excess make-up and skin oils after wearing your jewelry.
All organic gems should only be wiped clean with a soft cloth; pearl stone, coral, and amber are examples of organic gems and they need to be handled very carefully. Home ultrasonic cleanser should be used with extreme caution. It can be used for ruby, sapphire and amethyst, however, it could damage gems such as amber, lapis lazuli and turquoise.
Try to be very careful when you are using soaking method for cleaning jewelry that has soft stones such as amber, lapis lazuli, pearl or turquoise.
Storing Gemstones
Try to store your gemstones carefully. Store them in a way so as to prevent them from scratches. If possible, store each piece in a separate box. Soft stones like pearl, lapis lazuli, malachite, turquoise, amber and opal can get very easily scratched by pin and edges of jewelry. Try to protect these stones by wrapping them in jeweler’s tissue.
Perfume
Try to remove your gemstones while you’re using perfumes. It can diminish the color of the gemstone. Perfume should always be sprayed on before wearing jewelry.
Other Chemicals
Chlorine, bleach, turpentine and ammonia can cause harm to the gemstone. This chemical can dull or even pit the surface of softer gemstones. Petroleum-based products can melt amber if allowed to remain on the stone for long time.
Toothpaste
There are lots of articles which recommend toothpaste to use in the jewelry. But we don’t recommend toothpaste for the gemstone. Although the abrasive in toothpaste is great for the teeth, they can damage the surface of the metal. Toothpaste can also tarnish the surface of lapis, turquoise, amber, resulting in the fine polish which was produced by the skilled lapidary.