Emerald is a stone you can wear for a lifetime, but it asks for slightly different habits than a diamond. Almost all of the damage we see in the workshop comes from three or four avoidable things.
Never do these
- Ultrasonic cleaners. The vibration drives oil out of the fissures and can widen them. This is the fastest way to ruin an emerald, and it happens most often at a jeweler who was not told what the stone was.
- Steam cleaners. Same problem, with heat added.
- Solvents, acetone, bleach, alcohol. They strip the treatment.
- Hot water and sudden temperature changes. Leave the ring off in the sauna and the hot tub.
How to clean it
Lukewarm water, a drop of mild dish soap, a soft toothbrush on the setting rather than scrubbing the stone, and a soft cloth to dry. That is the whole method. Done once a month it keeps a piece looking the way it did in the store.
When to take it off
Before cleaning the house, gardening, swimming in chlorine, working out, and applying perfume, sunscreen or hairspray. Emerald sits around 7.5 to 8 on the Mohs scale, which sounds hard, but its internal fissures make it far more vulnerable to a knock than the number suggests.
Storage
Separately, in a soft pouch or a lined compartment. Loose in a jewelry box, a diamond or a piece of harder jewelry will scratch it. Very dry environments over long periods are not ideal either, since they accelerate oil loss.
The five-year check
Bring the piece to a jeweler every few years to have the setting checked and, if the stone has dried out, re-oiled. Re-oiling is a normal maintenance operation, not a repair, and it restores the appearance the stone had when you bought it. Prongs loosen over time; noticing that during a checkup is much cheaper than noticing it when the stone is gone.
Would you rather settle it in person, with the stones in front of you? We are in the Edificio Pombo, open every day from 10:00 am to 7:00 pm.
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