Certain activities make jewelry prone to damage, especially rings. Prongs wear faster, rings bend, and stones scratch or break.
Diamonds, like wood, have “directional hardness.” If you hit a piece of wood in a particular direction, it breaks. Diamonds do too.
Read on for when you should remove your rings.
Remove your rings before exercising and outdoor activities
Fox Fine Jewelry recommends removing your rings at the gym, particularly for weight lifting. Weights can scratch or chip stones, and often misshape the back of rings. Other sports you should remove your ring for include tennis, golf, rock climbing, skiing, etc. Any activity where your ring might receive impact!
Remove your rings before working with tools or gardening
Impact damages rings. We recommend you remove them before picking up a hammer, moving heavy boxes, or operating machinery.
Gloves help protect rings, but at Fox Fine Jewelry we still see damage from gardening, even with gloves on! This is true even for diamond rings. While it’s less likely your diamond will chip with gloves on, prongs wear faster and the backs of rings can get misshaped.
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"I especially love that they gently make suggestions about my jewelry, how to fix or add to it, and at no time do I feel like they are just trying to make a sale. The feeling I have when I am there is that I am their friend and they will take good care of me."
Take off your jewelry before swimming
Pools and hot tubs have chlorine, which makes the metal in rings brittle over time (and turns sterling silver jewelry black). Hot springs have sulfur, which will also turn sterling silver black.
When swimming, the cool water can make your fingers shrink. It’s not uncommon for rings to fall off, making them difficult or impossible to find. This is especially true when swimming in the ocean!
Take off your rings before cleaning
Harsh cleaning products containing bleach gradually make metal brittle (platinum excluded). Brittle prongs break more easily, potentially causing a stone to fall out. Avoid bleach, chlorine, acetone, ammonia, and turpentine if your ring contains softer gemstones like opal, lapis, turquoise, pearls, or apatite.
You should also remove your ring when washing dishes so it doesn’t hit against the sink or fall into the garbage disposal. But if your ring has gone through the garbage disposal, in many cases Fox Fine Jewelry can restore it!