Collecting jewellery is one of the most fun and interesting hobbies you can have. Who doesn’t want to be surrounded by beautiful jewels and spend their days discovering new items? But sometimes it can be a bit difficult knowing where to start. To help get your collection off the ground here are a few top tips covering what you need to know and where to find the best information. This Beginners’ Guide to Collecting Jewellery has got it all – from how to remove rust from beautiful vintage pieces to knowing which items to buy. ~ A Guest post by John Brasington
Beginners’ Guide to Collecting Jewellery
1. Research, research, research
The key to a successful collection is research, research, research. Although this might bring up unhappy memories of schoolwork, it can actually be quite fun. Spend time browsing the best jewellery blogs and retailers online. Look at what the latest fashion websites are recommending and get a feel for your own personal sense of style. You’ll want to learn more about the different types of jewellery collections you can go for, such as costume, precious, or contemporary and understand the different materials involved. Once you’ve got a basic understanding, it will be much easier to work out the best items for you to buy.
2. Focus or variety?
The next issue to consider is how you want to curate your collection. Essentially you have one of two choices: you can either decide on a particular type of jewellery and focus all your purchases around that, or you can opt for variety and bring together a range of different styles. For example, you could focus only on vintage costume jewellery made from more affordable materials like Bakelite. Or you could hone your knowledge around precious pieces incorporating beautiful stones like sapphires or rubies, which could be previously owned. There is much to be said for either approach so if you’re finding it difficult to choose, think about your own personality. If you are someone who likes building up expertise and getting into the details of a subject, go for a more focused collection choosing a particular type or style. If you’re more about new and different experiences in life, avoid focus and think diversity.
 |
| Indian Choker Necklaces in Green – Kemp (Vadaseri), Minakari and Tribal beaten silver and glass |
The thing about focusing on a particular type of jewellery is that you’re going to own a lot of whatever type you choose to focus on. So if you focus on a material or colour, you’re going to end up with lots of it, and you’re going to know everything about it: how it gets made, how to clean it, strange chemistry knowledge about caring for it, and more. For instance, if you choose to collect Glass beaded jewelry, learn about all the glass bead finishes. They can be relatively inexpensive to collect. And if you focus on a style or a theme, you’re going to fill your brain with history, and trivia, and strange bits of knowledge about artists. This is all really exciting, but the most important thing to remember when making these choices is to…
3. Buy what you actually like! (& will wear)
And this brings us to one of the most important pieces of advice for a new collector: don’t get side-tracked by investments or fashion. The key to enjoying and being committed to your jewellery collection long-term is buying items that you really love. When you find something that excites you, or go home from a shopping session still thinking of that one particular ring, that’s reason enough to add it to your collection.
4. Clean your jewellery regularly
Finally, a key tip: cleaning. This is a good habit to get into right from the start. It’s vital that your necklaces, earrings, and other jewels are in good condition. Sometimes it can be tricky to know how to clean everything, especially if your collection includes lots of mixed media pieces. The best thing to do is to look online for useful guides like how to remove rust (a vintage jewellery must!), how often to clean, and what tools to use.
Those are just a few starter points to get you going. Once you buy your first few items you’ll get into the swing of it and become a huge jewellery fanatic. Just remember to do your research on everything from how to remove rust from your favourite pieces to what the latest fashion trends are. Buy pieces you actually like and most importantly, enjoy what you do!
Great Tips John, I am sure that this Beginners’ Guide to Collecting Jewellery would be really helpful to a lot of folks looking to start their collection. Thank you for joining us once again; Let me add two more tips to the list.
– Collect traditional jewellery from different regions, provinces, states or countries. Focus on small versatile pieces that are traditional/local to the region and soon you will have an eclectic collection.
– Last but not the least – Fix a budget!! Don’t to blow off your two months salary on a piece that you are hardly ever going to wear, no matter how much it “calls to you” at the moment. Instead, save to indulge in this hobby or invest in a piece everytime you get a bonus or an increment – That’s pretty much the Indian practice.
Also, buy what looks good on you – I personally don’t believe in buying jewellery for the locker. I believe that Jewellery must be used, savoured, admired, and be admired in.
About the guest – John Brasington is a veteran of unsavoury household arrangements and learned to clean in the trenches of student living. Now he writes about cleaning and whatever else takes his fancy.
I hope you found it interesting
Cheers
Leave a Reply