Materials & Maintenance

Maintenance

Treat your jewellery just like any other quality item in your wardrobe. Shoes and clothes need to be regularly dry-cleaned, repaired or serviced. Jewellery needs care too. Jewellery can become tarnished by oxidation or dirty by wearing it. Jewellery can lose it’s high polish shine and matte surfaces can become shinier with wear.

Tips

To ensure everlasting joy here are tips how to treat your jewellery.

• Please put on your jewellery after applying make up, hairspray, parfum, etc.
• Avoid direct contact with water. Do not wear your jewellery while taking a bath, washing your hands or doing the dishes etc. Do not wear your jewellery while swimming.
• Avoid contact with acids and cleaning products.
• Store your jewellery in a dry and secure place. Avoid damp environments like your bathroom or the tropics ;-)
• Avoid impact with hard surfaces as much as possible.
• Sweat affects jewellery. Therefor do not wear jewellery while sleeping or participating in sporting activities.

Plated jewellery

Gold plated jewellery from the collection need some extra love and care. The plated layer of gold on top of the brass jewel is very thin: it is not the question if it will wear of but when it will wear off. This is influenced by how you treat your gold plated jewellery so please take extra care of it. Also it can be influenced by the ph value of your skin. If you don't want the gold layer to wear off: consider buying the piece in solid 14K gold. 

Cleaning

To remove any dirt you can clean your jewel with warm soapy water and a soft toothbrush. Use a soft cloth to keep your jewellery shiny and remove oxidation. Take extra care when cleaning jewellery with gemstones and pearls.

Service

It is also possible to request a service treatment. I will clean your jewellery from dirt and oxidation and I will bring back the shine. Matte surfaces can be made matte again. If your jewellery is in need of repair or a service treatment please contact me and I will be happy to assist you.

Materials

I work in the following materials:

• Silver is a very white metal and I love to work in silver as it has a lot of character. For my jewellery I use 925 silver, also know as sterling silver. Silver ages beautifully, it becomes a little darker on deeper parts of the jewel. Did your silver jewel tarnish? Check out my tips for cleaning your silver jewellery here. 
• Plated brass in my collection I offer "gold" jewellery for an affordable price. If your choose gold plated brass it means the piece is made from brass with a very thin layer of real gold on top of it. But be aware: as this layer is very thin it will wear off over time. This is completely normal for gold plated jewellery. Therefore gold plated jewellery needs a little more care: you need to regularly replate your pieces. 
• Gold is the best! It is available in different alloys. An alloy means that the gold is melted together with other metals to control colour and hardness of the gold. 24K is gold in its pure form, it is to soft to wear. I use 18K and 14K gold to make jewellery. Depending on the alloy, gold can have different colours. From white gold, yellow gold and red gold.

Quality stamp

In most of my jewellery you can find different kind of stamps. Dutch regulations require that all silver jewellery over 8 gram and all gold jewellery over 1 gram is marked with hallmarks. The hallmarks give you information about the material and the maker.

I do not place the hallmarks myself, this is done by a guarantee institution who also tests the jewellery. So you can be sure to know your jewellery is made out of genuine precious metals.

With a magnifying glass you are able to find the following hallmarks in my jewellery: