Emerald Cut Green Stone Studs with Pearl Drops

A pair of studs in gold-tone brass, set with cubic zirconia and coloured stones. The design is built around a geometric panel. Photographed in Green.

Geometric settings arrived in Indian jewellery with Art Deco in the 1920s and never left. They suit cubic zirconia particularly well, because a machine-cut stone is already a geometric object.

What you are looking at

The matching earrings are small studs, which is unusual in a set of this kind — most bridal sets leave you with earrings you can wear once a year.

Small pearls finish the lower edge. Pearls do something no faceted stone can — they give back a soft, diffused light, which calms a design that would otherwise be all sparkle.

What it is made of

The clear stones are cubic zirconia, sold across India as American Diamond, or simply AD. Cubic zirconia is a laboratory-grown crystal of zirconium dioxide, and it is not an imitation in the way glass is: it is a genuinely hard, singly refractive crystal, cut on the same wheels as diamond. It disperses light into slightly more colour than a diamond does, which is why a good AD piece reads as bright rather than as dull paste.

Those flat metal rims around the coloured stones are a kundan borrowing. Kundan setting beds a flat-topped stone in soft gold worked cold around its edge — no claws, no heat. The shape it leaves behind is the most recognisable thing in Indian jewellery, and it survives here in plated brass.

Which colours are stocked

There are 5 colourways: Green, Red, Sea Green, Purple and Baby Pink. The photographs show one of them and the swatches on this page show the rest; the shade you choose is confirmed on your enquiry before anything is charged.

It is plated brass — a gold polish over a brass body. That is what makes a piece this size affordable, and the brass is also why it has some heft rather than feeling like foil.

How to wear it

They suit hair tied back, and they go as happily with a plain cotton kurta as with silk — earrings are the one piece of Indian jewellery that never needs an occasion.

What you are buying at this price is design rather than material, and that is a reasonable thing to buy. The shapes here come out of a jewellery tradition several centuries old, and they work at a tenth of the weight and a hundredth of the cost of the gold versions.

Care and storage

Treat the plating as the wearing part. Keep it away from water, perfume and hair spray, put it on after you have finished dressing, and wipe it with a dry cotton cloth before it goes away. Stored dry in a zip pouch with the air pressed out, the finish lasts for years; left in a humid bathroom it will not last a season.

Rather than an add-to-cart button you will find an enquiry button, and that is deliberate: these arrive in small quantities per colour, and we would rather confirm the shade is in hand than refund you later. Payment is prepaid in every case; cash on delivery is not available.