wedding stuff: buying and caring for silver-plated serveware
shopping for silver-plated serveware for my wedding + notes from grandma about how to care for silver
first, i want to thank everyone who responded to my q&a! you all took so much time to fill it out, and all of your feedback is super helpful. so many of you had such great ideas - some of which i’ll be trying out over the next few months. as i go along and try new things, your feedback - in the comments section or just tapping the heart button - will be meaningful for me to gauge what you love and don’t love. thank you thank you thank you!!!!
for those of you who don’t care about wedding stuff, skip the next few paragraphs. below those you’ll find tips from my grandmother, a former antiques dealer of sterling silver (and wedgwood), on how to take care of your silver; my notes on spending 60+ hours over the last two weeks cleaning and inventory-ing my body weight in silver-plated items (according to the inventory it was just shy of 1.5k individual pieces); and i reveal where and how to look for silver plated items (and how to get a good deal).
for those who do care about wedding news… i’m getting married this year! théo and i are doing two different celebrations, which feels a bit over the top, but i keep telling myself there is a very practical reason as to why we are doing it this way (which sort of makes me feel better). théo’s entire family is located outside the united states (mostly in europe), and it would be a lot to ask them all to come to new york for a wedding celebration (especially his grandparents). so, we are doing a civil ceremony in paris with his family + my parents (more on that next month) and a larger wedding in new york with our friends and my family.
for our new york wedding celebration, it was never really a question as to who would cater the dinner and make the dessert - me and my team. by doing the food program myself i get to do my first ever full wedding catering job, and i’m excited for the challenge (and nervous, i have had 3 nightmares this month about not being thoroughly prepared and failing horribly). also, weddings are very expensive and we’re freeing up room in the budget this way.
for the catering, we’re going with a northern-renaissance-still-life-inspired vibe (to whoever in the q&a responses said i should do a dinner based on this theme, you made my jaw drop at the coincidence). to really bring this together, the tablescape needs to look just right. looking at some northern renaissance still lifes i came up with the following list of needs:
1. scrunched up tablecloths (i’m currently selecting the fabric)
2. mounted nautilus cups, (which are proving to be impossible to find in our budget, but i will keep dreaming about this and this in my cart, so i may attempt making my own, or more likely i will just buy a few shells) peep below the one i saw in madrid last summer on the day théo and i got engaged <3
3. silver-plated compotes, tazzas, serving bowls, and platters (not to mention serving spoons, forks, knives, tongs, cutlery, and more…)
regarding #3: i was originally thinking of supplementing my small collection (mostly from my grandma and ebay and etsy and poshmark) with items from a party rental company, but i soon realized with the amount needed we were looking at a hefty price tag. i figured i could probably find a way to purchase my own for cheaper, and i did: i was able to purchase enough cutlery, serving utensils, and platters for a fair amount less than it would have cost in rentals, and i got some really unique and fun pieces.
so, i thought i would share how i searched for the silver, and how you can clean and take care of it.
silver-plated items are probably less expensive than you think, or at least they are less expensive than i thought before i started purchasing them. as my grandmother explained to me, pure silver items are expensive because, well, they are pure silver. silver-plated items, on the other hand, are items that are made of a different metal and then coated in silver to make them look nice. these silver-plated items are far, far more affordable than the pure silver ones.
where to buy silver-plated serving dishes:
i am a big fan of second hand items - most of my clothes are used (generally from the real real) and every piece of furniture (besides our bed) was bought at auction - and just like my clothes and furniture i got all of my silver wares second hand. besides all the wonderful reasons to buy second hand (saving money, reducing pollution, giving an item a second life etc.), for silver you actually want to buy used (the items doesn’t have to be antique) because used items have patina, and patina just provides that je ne sais quoi to the meal/dish you’re serving (you can see it in the image above in the recesses of the embossed metal).
if you want the most bang for your buck in terms of quantity, local auctions are the way to go (by going local you will save on the shipping which will often cost more than the items themselves), but you have to be patient and diligent with searching (this is how i got all the stuff shown above - i got all my platters, including shipping, for under a dollar a piece, and the cutlery for about a quarter).
if you’re just looking for a few items to add some zhuzh to your dinner parties, and you want it fast, ebay, etsy, and poshmark are my recommendations. ebay is wonderful because it has so so many pieces to choose from, etsy is great because it is a more curated selection, and i tend to find really good deals on poshmark. to look for silver-plated items on these websites, i like to just type in “silver plate + [insert here item i am shopping for].” here’s where knowing the names of different serving vessels or utensils is helpful. whether you’re looking for a large serving tray or platter, candy or nut dish, compote or tazza, salt cellar or trinkets bowl, it might be helpful for you to look up a list of the different kinds of serveware. you can type in different search terms for similar items (e.g. searching for “silver plate + tazza,” “silver plate + compote,” “silver plate + nut dish,” and “silver plate + candy dish” as people may call the same item any of these names).
so now you’ve found some listings and you’re trying to decide whether you should purchase them. when looking at silver-plated items to purchase you need to be looking at the photos for scratches. and if there aren’t good enough detail shots, i would certainly recommend reaching out to the seller to get some additional condition shots (the reason i say this is you generally don’t know what metal is underneath the silver and a scratch on the silver exposes you to the metal). if all looks good, go ahead and order it! when it comes in, i just like to be extra careful and test it for lead with lead swabs. if there’s no lead, you’re good to go on to the cleaning!
i’ve laid out two cleaning methods below - they each have their pros and cons.
foil + baking soda + salt
if you are cleaning enough silver, and the objects aren’t too large, i like to do the tin foil + baking soda + salt method. note that my grandma does not like this method because it may get rid of the patina, and it does very occasionally, but most of the time it remains and i love the convenience of this method.
to start, set a gallon of water to boil. while that’s going, line a large pot, your clean sink, or your clean bathtub (recommended if you have a lot to clean or you’re cleaning a large platter) with tin foil. then place your silver object(s) on top of the tin foil making sure they are in contact with the foil and that there is space between them and they are not touching each other. then pour 1 cup of baking soda and 1 cup of salt over the silver-plated items. open a window before the next step because it can smell pretty bad. once the water is boiling, pour it over the silver-plated items + baking soda + salt, and let them sit until all the foaming has subsided. (make sure your items are fully submerged in the water, otherwise the below image will happen, where all the tarnish moves to the side that’s not in the water. if they aren’t submerged, you can flip the items over with tongs to try and get the tarnish off of the other side, but you may end up needing to clean them with polish later).
unless the items are heavily tarnished, you should be able to use tongs to remove them from the hot water as soon as the bubbling subsides. i also like to quickly rinse them off in some soapy water and set them aside to dry on a towel. while that dries, i place another round of silver-plated items onto the foil and remove them as soon as the tarnish is gone. eventually, the water will be gross and the items will not be cleaning so well and you'll need to remove the water, change out the tin foil, and repeat from the beginning until all of your items are cleaned. once you’ve removed the tarnish wash all your items with with soap and water, dry it with a clean microfiber cloth, and let it sit on a clean cloth/towel until fully, fully dry (this is super important, otherwise it will rust and pitt). then you should wrap it in pacific silvercloth (to prevent it from tarnishing quickly) and store it somewhere dry. if your items are insanely tarnished and this just isn’t working, you can try soaking it for longer, or try soaking multiple times repeatedly cleaning out the water (the platter in the image below had already soaked for two hours and had a few water changes), but if that’s still not doing anything there is one other step i will take to clean it:
pour some white vinegar in a bowl and soak a scrubbing sponge in it, then i’ll place some salt on the scrubber and begin scrubbing the silver plated item, not too hard, just in gentle circular motions, until the silver is clean (i would not recommend anything more abrasive than a sponge as you risk damaging the silver plate). i will then repeat all of the above soaking steps to make sure the tarnish is off and the item is clean. this is also a great method for removing any rust!
silver polish
let’s say the item you’re trying to clean is really bulky and can’t easily be submerged anywhere, or you need to use many many gallons of boiling water, or you did use the boiling water trick but some of the ends of your items held onto the tarnish (e.g. the edge of a spoon or the tip of a knife) - this is when i like to start using silver polish, my grandmother’s preferred method from the get-go.
first, put on some gloves and cover your work surface with a cloth, newspaper, or trash bag (silver polish is toxic, so you want to be careful). then, apply a layer of wright’s silver cream (this is the only one my grandmother uses) onto the item you’re cleaning with the sponge from the canister. repeat with all of your items. thoroughly wash the polished pieces with a sponge (use a separate one than the one you use for your dishes!) and lots of soap and water, then quickly dry it with a clean microfiber cloth to prevent pitting or rusting, and then let it dry fully (super important, otherwise it will pitt). once dry, wrap it in pacific silvercloth (to prevent it from tarnishing quickly), and store somewhere dry.
i do an added step: after drying it and before putting it away, i usually like to put some rubbing alcohol on some cotton pads and go over the surface of the silver just to be sure i have lifted all the silver polish from the item (as the silver polish is toxic). and for this same reason, i recommend doing a super thorough clean of the surface i was polishing the silver on, and putting all of the clothes you wore directly in the wash.
Good luck on the New York portion of the wedding!!
How do you know that the item is silver and not stainless steel of example? Is there a stamp like there is with jewelry?