Engagement Ring Care Guide: 5 Things You Should Be Doing
If you’re like most of us, you love your jewelry but are quite neglectful in looking after it. Even the most expensive diamond ring needs some TLC now and then and all jewelry benefits from being cleaned, and we believe each person should have their own engagement ring care guide to help them take care of their jewelry properly.
Most of us don’t even give thought to how we store our jewelry. Even though precious metals and gemstones are quite durable, tumbling all your items together in a heap in a jewelry box doesn’t do it any good at all. It gets scratched, twisted and bent, tangled up, and may even break.
It is probably fair to say that certain pieces of jewelry are much more important than others that you own, and right up at the top of your list is your diamond engagement ring!
Alongside your wedding band, your engagement ring is the most critical item of jewelry that you will ever own, and when you think about it in these grand terms, making sure that you take as good care of it as possible becomes even more important than you might have first imagined.
Here are 5 of the most important tips to add to your official engagement ring care guide.
1. Clean It Regularly
You should clean your engagement ring regularly. You would be amazed by how many supposed jewelry lovers tend to overlook this very basic rule!
With constant daily wear, your ring is going to suffer a buildup of grime and oils that will eventually begin to impact the light interactions of the center stone and reduce its luster. There is no point in having a beautiful sparkly large carat ring if you aren’t going to do everything you can to make it look stunning alongside your wedding ring.
Cleaning your ring isn’t a complicated task.
You can take your ring to a professional cleaning service provided by a jeweler. This usually involves a bit more science than the cleaning you would do at home. To clean the diamond, jewelers use an ultrasonic jewelry cleansing bath. High-frequency sound waves and chemicals create bubbles that are attracted to the dirt on the diamond. and pulls it away from the surface into the solution. To clean the whole ring, it is usually blasted with steam.
You might wish to consider having a professional clean periodically and clean it yourself at other times.
To clean your engagement ring at home, all you need to do is drop it into a mug or bowl of warm water (preferably soapy water), and let it sit there for a few minutes or even overnight if you have the time. Once thoroughly soaked, use something like a soft bristle toothbrush to gently scrub the ring, before rinsing and drying with a soft cloth (preferably a lint-free cloth).
The best in the business suggests that you should be doing this simple routine at least once every few weeks, with no real need for particular cleaning solutions. Good old-fashioned dish soap will do the job just fine.
2. Secure The Prongs
Diamonds are the hardest gemstones in the world, but that doesn’t mean that you don’t have to worry about their durability when on your finger. To keep your stones as safe as possible, you must ensure that all your vital ring settings are in good condition.
Ring security is mostly about making sure that the prongs are still strong and sturdy and that you don’t have loose stones. If you put your hands through a lot, check regularly to see if anything has cracked or shifted out of place due to wear and tear.
Equally, any major tarnishing to the band, the bezel, or even the center stone itself if you have something like an emerald rather than a diamond, should be monitored often. Any significant damage might call for some resizing.
3. Know When To Take It Off
Although an engagement ring is that kind of thing that you never want to be without once the question has been ‘popped’, there are certain situations and occasions when it is wiser to take it off.
A day at the beach, for example, is one of the worst situations for wearing any ring, let alone an engagement ring! Not only do you run the risk of losing it forever in the ocean, but the grains of sand can tarnish some of the metal or stones.
When at home, it is also a good idea to take off your ring when doing any kind of cleaning that requires harsh chemicals like bleach, as they can interact negatively with the materials.
Equally, a good habit to get into is removing your ring when applying lotions to your hands, as having to slather the products onto the band is a surefire way to encourage dirt and oil buildup. Gunk can easily sit between prongs and open bezel styles.
4. Keep Ring Dishes Around Your Home
Can you imagine the horror of taking your ring off when the occasion calls for it but not being able to find it again? It’s surprisingly easy to forget where you put it or for it to accidentally get lost.
A handy tip is to have little ring dishes around your home so you always have a safe place to put your ring when you take it off and also obvious places to look when you want to put it back on again.
The best places to have the dishes are close to where you do the task that usually prompts you to take off your ring. Places like by the kitchen sink, on the bathroom vanity, and even the garage or basement.
5. Buy Insurance For Your Engagement Ring
You can provide your care and protection at home, but unfortunately, it isn’t only your actions that you need to worry about when it comes to taking the best care of your engagement ring!
To make sure that you are covered for every eventuality in terms of ring safety and damage, the smartest thing to do is take out insurance.
Most people will assume their homeowner's insurance will cover it. In most cases, it will, but you should ensure that you have an all-encompassing insurance policy that offers protection against things like damage and theft, missing valuables, and any other type of situation that might lead to the disappearance or fatal breakage of your engagement ring.
The more expensive the original cost of the ring was, the more highly we would recommend insuring it for as much as you can afford. The rates will be slightly different depending on the value and details of the ring but knowing that you have a good insurance policy in place is peace of mind.
Your engagement ring not only has monetary value but also sentimental value. Of course, any ring can be replaced should the worst-case scenario happen but it will never be the same as your original ring, so be sure to take good care of it.