Well, taken in context the speaker is obviously an artist and wants her to look at his art work. However 'Come up and see my etchings' is also used by a man to lure a woman into his apartment for a little bit of 'the other' (he hopes). It has become a bit of a joke. "Did he ask you to come up and see his etchings on the first date?'

"As it were" means very little. It is a filler like "so to speak" or "you see" or "basically" or "you know" or "I mean". I agree with what Glenn and Leigh said.