Summer 2022 was the first proper travel summer in three years, and the jewellery conversation through June reflected exactly that. The pieces we kept seeing on the right people had a vacation-bound, slightly playful quality — beaded earrings in candy colours, freshwater pearl chokers stacked over bare collarbones, anklets quietly returning to public life, and the kind of body chain that made a slip dress feel finished. The independent designers who had been building this category through the past few years all had strong summer collections in stores by mid-June, and our wishlist was longer than usual. Here are the names we kept coming back to as the heat properly settled in.
Beaded earrings as a personality piece
The fine-jewellery rules had quietly relaxed for summer, and the beaded statement earring was suddenly back on every editor we followed. Brinker & Eliza, the New York studio founded by Brinker Holland and Eliza Carlson, had been the reference point for hand-strung beaded drops in jewel tones since 2019, and the Dorothea pair in turquoise was the one we kept reaching for. Susan Alexandra, Susan Korn’s downtown New York label, had built an entire universe out of acrylic beads and unironic joy, and the matching earring-and-bag combinations were impossible to ignore in any restaurant on the Lower East Side. Roxanne Assoulin‘s enamel-bangle brand had stretched into earrings as well, with the stacked-rainbow look that suited the season. The rule was simple: the louder the jewellery, the lighter the rest of the outfit could be.
Pearls came back, in a less expected form
The freshwater pearl had its biggest revival in a decade by summer 2022, and the styling had shifted decisively from the deliberate strand to the layered, chunky, slightly-irregular pearl piece. Danish-born designer Sophie Bille Brahe remained the prestige reference, with her Peggy and Petite Peggy ear pieces appearing on every editorial we read; the Daniella necklace was the most-requested piece in her stockists. Mateo, the New York studio that had been quietly making some of the cleanest fine pearl pieces in the field, took the same direction at a slightly more accessible price. Mejuri‘s Baroque Pearl Drops kept the entry-level conversation alive. The thread connecting all of it was that the pearl had stopped reading “twin set” and started reading “summer wedding.”
Body chains and belly chains returned
The Y2K body jewellery revival had been threatening since 2021, and June 2022 was when it actually arrived. Jacquie Aiche‘s Bohemian-coded belly chains and body chains, in fourteen and eighteen karat gold with scattered diamonds, were the prestige reference; the studio had been making this category from before its current revival, and the staying power showed. Adina’s Jewels had the more accessible chain selection at a friendlier price point. The look worked best with a bare-back dress, a slip, or under a sheer blouse — and worked far better in real life than it ever did in styled photography. We were not going to wear one to brunch, but it was the kind of small, confident, slightly-private styling decision that suited a year of finally going out again.
Anklets quietly came back
The anklet had been quietly disqualified from grown-up jewellery conversation for over a decade, but the 2022 version of it was different — more architectural, less Y2K beach-shop, mostly fine gold rather than mall jewellery. Foundrae, which we wrote about in our winter 2021 jewellery roundup, had quietly added an anklet category to the line. Loren Stewart kept the everyday-fine-gold lane with a thin bracelet-style anklet that read as the most editor’s-favourite version of the trend. Catbird‘s Sweet Nothing Threadbare anklet felt like the entry-level version of the same idea. The piece worked best with a bare ankle and a flat sandal, and not at all with anything else.
Independent design continued to lead
The wider thesis of the year was that the most interesting jewellery was being made in small studios rather than big maisons, and summer made that case more clearly than any other season. Pamela Love‘s talisman pendants and zodiac coins kept their place on every editor’s neck. Yvonne Léon, the Paris-born studio whose clip-on earrings had become a cult favourite among second-piercing-resistant editors, had a particularly strong summer collection of pearl and shell motifs. Australia’s own N Jewellery handmade-to-order earrings and pendants kept their lane as the ship-to-the-US discovery for anyone wanting something nobody else’s group of friends already had. The lesson of summer was that buying small was both the more interesting and the more enduring way to dress.
Closing
Summer 2022 jewellery shopping had a slightly looser, slightly more playful quality to it than the winter equivalent — more enamel, more colour, more layering. We were leaving July with a beaded earring on standby, a freshwater pearl drop in our bag, a Foundrae anklet on the wishlist, and a small handful of independent designers we expected to keep watching for years. We will be back on the first Tuesday of July with our look at what was actually working in the heat through the rest of summer; in the meantime, we will see you wearing pearls to dinner.