Six Petal Flower Payal with Teardrop Drop

Payal is simply the Hindi word for an anklet, and in most of India it is still the first piece of jewellery a girl is given and the last an older woman takes off. It is worn as a pair, one on each ankle, and traditionally it was meant to be heard as much as seen — the sound announced that someone was coming, which in a joint household was a courtesy rather than a performance.

The design

A six-petal flower sits at the front of this anklet — a round cabochon centre with six pear-cut petals around it — and from its lower edge hangs a single teardrop stone on a small jump ring, free to swing. Either side, a three-petal sprig in the same stones steps the design down to a plain snake chain.

The hanging drop is what separates this from the other flower anklets here. A stone fixed into a setting is a static thing; a stone on a ring moves independently of the piece, so it catches light at a different angle every step. It is the cheapest way to put motion into jewellery and it is why almost every piece of traditional Indian ornament has something dangling from it.

Materials used

The stones are pale rather than deep — this is a soft piece, closer to a pastel than a jewel tone, and it reads as delicate rather than grand. The chain is a snake chain, close-coiled and round in section with no visible links, so there is nothing to press against the ankle bone and nothing to kink.

A word on the stones, because it matters when you are choosing a colour. These are glass and cubic zirconia, not gemstones, cut and polished and set by hand into closed metal bezels. That is the traditional setting for Indian costume jewellery and it does two useful things: the closed back holds the stone securely against the knocks an anklet takes, and it puts a dark oxidised rim around every stone so the colour reads clearly instead of washing out against the metal.

Colours and availability

It also means the colours are saturated rather than subtle. A sea green here is a true green-blue, a ruby is a deep pink-red, and the baby pink is pale and milky rather than bright. The photographs on each swatch are of that exact colourway, so trust them over the colour name.

Four colourways are stocked. Green is the pale aqua-green of the main photograph, the softest of the four. Baby Pink is the milky pink and the easiest to wear in daylight. Red gives more contrast against the blackened metal. Multi mixes the colours across the settings and is the best-stocked.

German silver is the trade name for a bright white alloy of copper, nickel and zinc. It contains no silver at all. What it does have is a hard, cool-toned surface that takes an oxidised finish well and resists scratching better than plated brass, which is why almost every everyday Indian anklet is made to look like it.

Styling it

At this price, with a hanging drop and a snake chain, this is the best-value stone-set anklet in the range. It is quiet enough for everyday and pretty enough for a function, which is a harder balance than it sounds.

A note on wearing a pair rather than one. Single anklets have become common and there is nothing wrong with wearing one, but a pair sits differently: the two sounds fall slightly out of step as you walk, which is what produces the soft irregular jingle people associate with payal rather than a single repeating note.

Care and storage

An anklet lives a harder life than any other piece of jewellery. It meets shoes, floors, door frames and bedsheets, and it is the piece most likely to be worn into the shower because taking it off is a nuisance. Water is what dulls an oxidised finish fastest and it is also what loosens a bezel-set stone over time, so slip it off before bathing. A dry soft cloth is the whole cleaning routine — never a silver polish or a dip, which strip the blackening the design depends on and can fog the stones.