Taking Care of Your Stainless Steel Products

A guide to easy, simple and safe cleaning and restoration of your favourite Stelton, and other stainless steel, pieces.

-Below are tried and tested methods that are safe and effective for taking care of your stainless steel products.

Danish designs of the 1950s-1970s are world-famous, and include some fantastic homewares, which are at once incredible pieces of art found at MoMA and the British Museum, while also being durable and useful in the home. One way designers achieved this perfect balance is by producing the designs in stainless steel.

Companies like Stelton with designs by Arne Jacobsen and Erik Magnussen, and Georg Jensen's many highly popular flatware designs, centre around high-quality stainless steel. And they are stunning.

However, as anyone who has ever used stainless steel pieces regularly knows, they love to hold a fingerprint.

In our childhood home the EM77 stainless steel coffee thermos was a staple. Always out for daily use, as well as special occasions. However, because it is so tall, we had to keep it, not in the cupboard, but above the cupboard, where the main method of getting it down quickly was gripping around the main body.

And each time another lovely set of fingerprints appeared.

And just so on the salad bowl, each time it is passed around, or the salt shaker when you've seasoned your food.

And it's such a bummer, especially the first time you experience this.

It may also be that something else gets on the surface, like food or grease. And now it looks terrible.

So what do you do now, that the coffee pot is about to go on the table, but your grubby fingers are all over it?

Well, in actual fact, taking care of your stainless steel products really is very simple. And, it can be fairly quick too, getting rid of those unattractive finger marks.

Our main go-to is, quite simply, window cleaner used with a paper towel or a tea towel. It works wonders.

This is just one version of the good old classic window-cleaner that we use. The simplest one, without fuss and scents.

This is the place we would recommend you start, cause it does take care of most of it, usually. However, there are also other methods that we recommend, depending on your situation. These are all listed below.

See the list below for all our recommendations for cleaning stainless steel:

Window cleaner will, with a small amount of elbow grease, get into the grease left on the item, and remove it, while polishing the entire surface. Since fingerprints are mainly grease, these come off without too much trouble. This also helps remove marks from poorly dried-off water after washing.

Window cleaner is particularly good for making your pieces presentable quickly.

Home ethanol, pure spirits - Using this will also remove grease and stickiness easily, and does not damage the surface of stainless steel. If you have a sticker that's left glue, or some old tape, ethanol will do the trick really fast.

Dish Soap and Water - Completely normal dish soap and warm water is always a safe way to thoroughly clean the inside, or outside of your stainless steel pieces.

• A note on using the Dishwasher: for items of pure stainless steel, the dishwasher can be fine. Flatware will usually be great in there - but do be mindful that your soap / tabs are friendly for the materials. HOWEVER - the pieces which feature, for instance, black handles, or other non-steel parts, will not be best advised in the dishwasher. The handles will be damaged and the colour is likely to fade / go white-ish. So make sure you wash those by hand.

Magic Erasers - some marks / stains can be a little tougher, and may have been left by things other than grease. In some cases the little white sponges can be super easy lifesavers, because they do the work with minimal effort from you. They are particularly great for removing tea and coffee stains, which is usually a super tedious task.

HOWEVER - do be warned! Using these sponges should be done sparingly and with open eyes. And, do use them mainly on brushed steel. The sponges work, because they have a micro-abrasive surface, which effectively super-fine sort of sand paper. So, using it on highly polished, glossy surfaces could leave marks.

NB: These situations can be different based on products available in different countries, so please try it on a small area before continuing to the full piece, making sure that the result you get is what you want.