Kundan Stud with Enamel Rim

A pair of studs in gold-tone brass, set with cubic zirconia and coloured stones. Photographed in Red.

The design

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.

What it is made of

Several stones are set polki-style, flat-topped and bedded in a rim of metal rather than gripped in claws. That is the older Indian way of setting a stone, and it gives a broad calm flash instead of a point of sparkle.

Colour is laid in as enamel rather than as stones in places, which lets the design hold a flat field of colour that no setting could.

The white stones here are cubic zirconia — American Diamond, or AD, in the Indian trade. It is grown rather than mined, cut to the same geometry as a diamond, and noticeably more dispersive, so it breaks white light into visible colour. That dispersion is the quality you are actually buying.

The broad rim around each coloured stone is the kundan idiom, carried over from a technique in which pure gold foil is pressed cold around the stone until it holds. Nothing here is gold foil, but the proportions are the ones that technique produced.

Colours and availability

2 colourways are stocked: Red and Green. 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.

The base is brass under a premium gold polish. Brass is the right base for costume jewellery — heavy enough to feel like something, soft enough to be worked, and it does not go brittle with age.

Styling 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.

Keeping it looking right

The care is simple and it matters: no water, no perfume, no chemicals on the metal. Wipe it dry after wearing and store it sealed rather than in open air, because humidity is the enemy of any plated finish.

If you are building a set, the pieces in this collection are drawn from the same supplier and the same finish, so a necklace and a pair of earrings bought separately here will match in tone. That is not true across brands, where one gold polish can be visibly cooler than another.

This piece is listed for enquiry rather than instant checkout, because stock on the colour you want has to be confirmed before we take money for it. Use the enquiry button on this page and we will come back with availability, the final price and a delivery window. Payment is prepaid in every case; cash on delivery is not available.