In-Depth Jewellery Care Guide

Our jewellery is designed and built to last, perhaps even be passed down! If treated with the same care that we took making it, then you will have your Armét jewellery looking and working great for the rest of your life. Being kinetic, our jewellery is more affected by dirt than other jewellery. Once it gets into your hands, here are some tips to follow.

General Cleaning

 All jewellery needs to be cleaned from time to time. Wearing it in everyday life will expose your jewellery to a variety of greases and oils, makeup, soaps, and other dirt. These residues will get caught in all the crevices and corners in your jewellery. If you find that the gears don't move as well over time, this is likely why, and it will stay this way until you get around to cleaning your jewellery.

This is something you can do yourself! Different materials may need to be taken care of differently, but we use primarily brass and stainless steel in our jewellery. Both of these metals are hard, harder than many karats of gold (some 14k white gold may be an exception, close to as hard as stainless steel), silver, and copper.

The following instructions will work to clean Armét jewellery, and are gentle enough that they should work on most other metal jewellery. However, we are not responsible for any damage done while cleaning.

How to Clean Your Jewellery (2-10 min.)

• Gather up the jewellery which needs cleaning.
• Gather up the jewellery which needs cleaning and a bowl of warm, soapy water. Dish soap works fine. Avoid caustic cleaners like Brasso, as these may damage the jewellery. If the jewellery in question has gemstones, warm water and soap shouldn't affect most, but low quality rubies, emeralds, ammolite, and moonstones don't react well to boiling water. However, we don't need boiling water, and no Armét jewellery uses these stones.
  
• You will also need a small brush of some kind. Stiff bristled toothbrushes should work well, steel brushes are a no. Alternatively, you could use a cloth of some kind for cleaning, but it may not reach into the corners as well as a brush will.
• Soak your jewellery in the hot water for a bit of time to loosen up the dirt you want to remove. The longer you soak, the easier it should come off (hypothetically). With your jewellery in hand, scrub away dirt with the brush or cloth.
• Visually inspect your handiwork. If there are gears to move, make sure they do so without difficulty. If you can't see any more signs of dirt and the movement is smooth then you're good! Rinse off your jewellery and dry it as well as you can.

Stainless Steel Plates

All of our plates are made out of stainless steel (but we have done custom sterling silver plates before). This is quite a hard material. Harder than gold or silver. However, because we primarily use a polished finish on the parts, it will scratch over time. Using a silver polishing cloth will restore the shine of your steel, and depending on the cloth, may even remove scratches.

Some of our designs which are thinner are susceptible to bending. If this happens, it is quite possible to carefully bend the plate straight again. If you decide to do this, you must use something soft, at least, softer than metal. In some cases you may be able to simply use your fingers, which is best. Pliers without a plastic coating or anything that can clamp onto the plate will likely leave marks in the metal. We at Armét are not responsible for any damage done while correcting the bend in a plate. We simply want to educate our customers in the case that they take matters into their own hands. Really, if you get into this situation, get in touch with us and we can resolve the problem for you specifically.

Brass Components

Much of what holds our jewellery together is made of brass. Over time, this material will tarnish and darken as a result. There are several ways you can remove this. The simplest way is to submerge your jewellery into a bath of white vinegar for a few hours. If the vinegar is warm then it will work more effectively. You can also use a silver polishing cloth or a commercial brass cleaner to remove the tarnish without damaging the jewellery. If you have stones in the jewellery you will also need to be careful about using vinegar. This is mostly relevant for pearls, amber, and other "organic" stones, but may affect certain minerals as well. Do your research if you are worried about this.

If any components of your jewellery appear to be loose (it happens once in a blue moon), get in touch with us and we can resolve the problem for you specifically.

Anodized Aluminum Gears

Aluminum is a light material that is lovely to work with. In our jewellery we use it to provide a pop of color on our gears, which is one of the strongest ways to personalize your own piece.

In caring for it, you must not use anything abrasive for cleaning. It is a material that does not tarnish, but if you get it dirty simply clean with warm soapy water. You can use a cloth or a toothbrush, but do not use a metal brush or other abrasive media (such as a ScotchBrite pad).

Stainless Steel Chain

The most important thing about taking care of chain is to be sure that you store it properly. Store it in such a way that knots cannot form and you will also avoid the irritating problem of trying to untangle chain. Otherwise, once in a while just inspect the links near either end of the chain to make sure they're not open. This can happen from pulling on the chain for any reason, and if loose enough can cause the chain to fall apart. If you notice that there are links that have opened up, they CAN be closed using two sets of pliers, but you should get in touch with us so that we can resolve the problem for you specifically.

Gears & Motion

Armét jewellery has the unique quality of being kinetic. While this means we have fantastically playful fidget jewellery, it also means that there is an extra level of complexity in our designs (allowing things to move). We double check that everything works as it should before we send out any piece, but once in a while the gear motion may stop being smooth. If this happens, follow the instructions above on how to clean your jewellery and see if that fixes it. If it doesn't, then the problem may be something out of alignment and you should get in touch with us. We will figure out a solution to the problem.