Polishing Sterling Silver Flatware

Sterling silver ice cream spoons (before and after polishing)

Look close, The left ice cream spoons were dirty and tarnished. After polishing it doesn’t even compare. Having your silver polished professionally is a huge difference from what you can do yourself at home.

entire set of sterling silver flatware polished

Georg jensen flatware polished

I was extremely careful with this set of Georg Jensen flatware to keep the hand hammered texture. The forks all had knife marks on the tines.

sterling flatware repaired and polished

All of these spoons arrived with damage, some worse than others. While they look great, I compromised between perfection, and keeping the detail in the handle, or thickness of the metal.

Removing knife marks from the backs of forks

All of these forks arrived with knife marks on the back of the fork tines. After filing and sanding the forks to remove the knife marks, the forks were carefully polished.

antique Sterling silver handles on steel forks

These three antique sterling silver handles were on steel forks. The steel forks tend to discolor and rust over time. Polishing the steel takes a great deal of time and effort. It is far more difficult than polishing the sterling silver handles. You can maintain the steel forks with Burt’s Lip Balm to prevent discoloration and rusting.

Professional Polishing of Sterling Silver Flatware

The polishing I do is not the same as what you are doing at home. This is a restoration of the appearance in every respect. I remove the knife marks on the back of the fork tines, and scratches in the surface. Garbage disposal damage is removed.

Sterling Silver Flatware with
Gold Plating

Sterling Silver Flatware with Gold Plating

Sometimes sterling silver flatware will have gold plating on it. I prefer to polish the gold plated sections by hand to preserve the gold plating. This set had three spoons with significant garbage disposal damage (see the photo below). I used my state-of-the-art TIG welder to fill in the scratches and gouges with sterling silver. Since the handles on the spoons had an engraving I had to compromise between filling in all the gouges perfectly or preserving the engraving. I always choose to preserve the engraving.

For more information about repairing garbage disposal damage and other flatware repairs CLICK HERE.

Sterling Silver Flatware with Gold Plating

Flatware sets can have numerous pieces. I can polish your flatware more efficiently and thoroughly than you can at home. With a set of 88 pieces, like this one, it still takes a long time. Each piece is given individual attention. Scratch marks and dings can be repaired with my state-of-the-art TIG welder. I will carefully hand-polish flatware when there is gold plating, as seen on the dessert forks in this set.