I’m sure you’ve seen a variation of this around if you’ve even been on Pinterest. I’ve seen a lot of different versions of it, so I thought I’d give it a try when my necklace took a dip in the hot tub with me and it didn’t like it. In about three seconds the bromine in the hot tub water took my shiny silver necklace to a tarnished, green-tinged mess.
Before. The chain looks pretty good, but the pendant looks awful.
Anyhow, I didn’t have any silver polish, and I wanted my shiny necklace back. So I thought I’d give this idea a try—I’d read a lot of different recipes, using things like salt, vinegar, and baking soda (USA / Canada), but always aluminum foil and boiling water. I figured I’d give it a go with aluminum foil, boiling water, and baking soda (USA / Canada), since baking soda (USA / Canada) has never done me wrong.
So, I lined a small bowl with a scrap of leftover aluminum foil, shiny(er) side up. I sprinkled in some baking soda (USA / Canada) (maybe 2 tsp), and poured in some boiling water from the kettle. After stirring everything with a wee spoon to dissolve the baking soda (USA / Canada), I tossed in my necklace and watched.
Check out the tip of the pendant! So shiny!
And you know what? It worked (partially)! I could actually see the tarnish fading away, which is pretty darn cool if you ask me. But it wasn’t totally tarnish free, so afterwards I had to polish it up with a microfibre cloth and then repeat the soak & polish to really bling it up.
Post soak, pre polish.
That was cool, but a few months later my silver plated cutlery was looking pretty blah (eggs + silver = brown). I wanted a quick polish, but I didn’t want to have to polish every piece with a cloth and potentially re-soak. So I experimented by tossing a bit of washing soda (a new cleaning love of mine) into the mixture, and the results were fantastic! Every piece of silver bounced back to its glowing, silvery self in mere moments, no cloth polishing & re-soaking required. Bam. Success.
Aluminum Foil & Soda Silver Polish
1 bowl, large enough to hold what you’re polishing
1 piece of aluminum foil, enough to line that bowl with
2 tsp baking soda (USA / Canada)
2 tsp washing soda
Boiling water, enough to dissolve the baking soda (USA / Canada) and amply cover the silverLine the bowl with the aluminum foil. Sprinkle in the baking & washing soda, and pour the boiling water over top. Quickly stir to dissolve, and then drop in your silver. Let is soak for five minutes or so, turning a few times.
Once you can see a noticeable difference, pull out your beautiful, shiny silver and admire your (lack of) effort.
Just in case you were wondering, this beautiful necklace was made by Melissa Pedersen
Here is a link to make your own washing soda. Not one store in my area carries it. Easy to do, as well!
http://hollythehomemaker.blogspot.com/2013/05/how-to-make-washing-soda-redux.html
Thank you for all your tips and recipes!
Happy New Year!
I love this tip—thanks for sharing, Claudia!
I am new to your site and find it very useful and engaging. I was wondering, what’s washing soda?
Hi Lisa! Thanks for reading 🙂 Washing soda is like baking soda’s bigger, stronger cousin. It’s sodium carbonate instead of sodium bicarbonate. It has lots of awesome uses including water softening, descaling, and laundry detergent—and, of course, silver polishing 🙂 You can get it in the laundry detergent section of your local grocery store. I found mine at Superstore, about $10/5kg.
I would like to try the jewelry polish recipe but I have no clue what washing soda is. Where can I find this? Does it just say “washing soda”? Thank you!
Washing soda is like baking soda’s big brother. It’s sodium carbonate instead of sodium bicarbonate, and can be found in a box in the laundry aisle at the grocery store. It should just say “washing soda” on it—mine does. Or, if you can’t find it, you can make it yourself from baking soda—Claudia provided a great link above 🙂 Have fun with all your shiny silver 😉
Dear Marie,
I didn’t know about that method, so I immediately tried – and it worked perfectly. I have a nice silver bracelet, and it turned shiny and bright again just within a minute. Thank you for sharing that idea! 🙂
Fantastic! I, too, have some silver to polish tonight for a party, and I’ll definitely be using this method 🙂
You can find washing soda in the laundry detergent at the grocery store !
And it is surprisingly heavy 😛 And awesome!
What about the gems in your silver jewelry? Will this mixture harm them? I have a silver ring with a stone that my mom gave me years ago and it needs a cleaning. Thanks!
I’m afraid I can’t say as I mostly use this method with silver plated cutlery, and use silver polish for smaller, more delicate things that include stones. That’s more a function of it being easier to use a wee bit of polish on an old toothbrush to do one small piece rather than boil water, find the soda, etc., not because I’ve noticed any damage to the jewellery.