Tag: gems

I was watching Wayne’s World on Saturday night – like everyone else on the internet, I believe – when I had the #totesoriginal plan to see if I could find a Wayne Campbell cap on Etsy. Just for shits.

Didn’t get as far as the hat, because I was distracted by these lilac resin Garth & Wayne photo earrings from seller, Pixie. I can’t imagine a time I’d wear them (apart from, I guess, all the time) but I do know I want them to be mine.

I’ve discussed before the fine line between mad art teacher and something actually a bit cool and different and this season’s ridiculous cocktail earrings definitely fall into this perilous category. I love big, gaudy plastic gems – but they definitely need a bit of sparkle or something to make them non-wacky.

Miu Miu are (as usual) at least party responsible for the trend – their Swarvoski/plexiglass lightning bolts are ostentatious but still feel pretty cool to me. Oh and Sharmadean Reid has them – you can’t argue with that kind of evidence.

D&G also did lol-jewels with their farfalle fancy-pants chandeliers. I mean, it’s a bowtiwe pasta and some gold virgin Mary medallions attached to a big crystal. There is nothing there that I can’t get behind.

The ASOS pink parrot drop earrings are absolutely enormous – click on the model pic if you don’t believe me. I think they’re a bit Club Tropicana/Heather Trott’s funeral but I admire the gusto of any retailer who can say yes to giant pink birds hanging off a big square, in turn hanging off an imitation diamond.

Slightly more tasteful, Marni’s horn and resin sunflowers are just art-and-craftsy enough to fit the bananas theme, but tasteful enough for that guy at work not to ask me questions.

There’s nothing better than ostentatious costume jewellery and ASOS has a fine selection from vintage expert, Susan Caplan. A guru in the world of antique finds, Susan has a fine eye for all things vintage and bedazzled – here are some of my favourites from ASOS.

Vintage Lea Stein Emerald Green Fox Brooch, £69

Nice little 60s fox from Lea Stein – the original queen of plastic jewellery. The combination of curving lines and emerald colouring make it feel a bit art deco, right?

Susan Caplan Vintage Enamel Lion Drop Earrings, £165

If you’re going to do 80s door knockers, you might as well do ’em properly. Buy them in memory of Pat Butcher, eh?

Vintage Chanel Gilt Metal Merine Blue Star Clip Earrings, £475

Well, I never said it was cheap. Nice though, aren’t they?

Vintage Chanel Octagon Logo Brooch, £484

Proper weakness for 80s Chanel, obviously. Love the textured gold detail on this, like a snazzy Ferrero Rocher wrapper.

Loads more less expensive picks on ASOS, and even more on the Susan Caplan site.

I saw My Salvation jewellery featured on Kingdom of Style a couple of weeks ago and was immediately taken with the stacking bracelets, which feature piles of religious charms.

Designer Dana Valente creates each set of bracelets individually, meaning the charms vary each time – I guess I lucked out because mine is all killer, no filler.

Featuring a hand-picked selection of vintage crosses and charms, as well as a swallow, heart and a few little jingly jangly extras, I couldn’t be happier with my choice.

I can’t spy any more bracelets on Dana’s Etsy shop at the moment, but there’s plenty of other rad jewellery and I’m sure that following their starring role on KoS, Dana will be inundated with requests for more.

By the way, they are also mega loud and make plenty of noise as you move around. This is a good thing, even if it does piss off your colleagues.

I have to be careful with novelty clothing – my fashion sense teeters perilously close to the brink of weird art teacher as it is and one wrong move with a misplaced brooch or excessive pattern could see me free-falling at speed in to the unfortunate ‘I’m mad me’/patterned tights brigade.

That said, I bought these lobster/shrimp/scorpion earrings last week from Topshop. They have a really authentically vintage feel to them, I think, through the pavé setting in the tail and neck and dull-gold detailing.

It’s love, and they almost make up for the other lobster item which I dream of… this Anthropologie dress from years back which I still get giddy about when I see people wearing in the street. That’s another eBay saved search right there, FYI.

And cue…

Graham Linehan is one of my favourite people to follow on Twitter, and not just because he’s such a big Jedward fan. Today he linked to a story about police in Lewisham using Flickr to reunite people with their stolen items – more specifically, jewellery.

Us Lewisham folk clearly have good taste, because the items displayed in the Lewisham Burglary Squad set are all pretty awesome.

Jewellery appreciation aside, I think this is a really neat idea – although how people will provide proof of ownership I’m not sure. The scheme has apparently already been used in Camden to great success, with about 5,000 people visiting the album – although no word on how many happy reunions have taken place.

Detective Chief Inspector Paul Astbury, Serious Acquisitive Crime at Lewisham said: “We are utilising every tool available to us to identify as many victims as possible and return this jewellery back to their rightful owners. Using Flickr works and this has already proved be the case in Camden. We hope that by making use of this technology people will look through the images and recognise their property. ”

If you recognise any of the jewellery, you can call PC Aaron Barr on 020 8284 5040 and reclaim it!

Rather taken with these Lenebelle tasselled bracelets, which remind me of the Confetti System tassel garlands I first spotted on Emily’s blog.