Square Cabochon Payal with Three Stone Clusters

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.

What you are looking at

The boldest anklet in the range. The stones here are large flat squares, each one a cabochon rather than a faceted stone, set in a plain heavy bezel with almost no decoration around it — the metal is there to hold the stone and nothing else. Two kinds of link alternate: a plain square set on point, and a square set square with a cluster of three round cabochons grouped beneath it.

That three-stone cluster is a direct borrowing from South Indian temple jewellery, where a principal stone sits above a group of smaller ones in a different colour, and it is the detail that gives this piece its weight of reference. In the main photograph the squares are green and the clusters below them red, which is the classic temple pairing.

Care and storage

What is unusual here is the restraint of the metalwork. There is no granulation, no filigree, no texture — just clean bezels and plain links. At this price that is a choice rather than a saving, and it is the right one: stones this large would be lost under decoration, and the plainness is what makes them read as substantial.

Metal and stones

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 two-colour temple arrangement in the main photograph, green squares above red clusters, and it is the most traditional. Sea Green, White and Baby Pink each run a single colour throughout, which makes the geometry of the links far more visible.

Stock is thin on this design — one or two pairs in each colour.

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.

When to wear it

This is a statement anklet for a wedding, a reception or a temple visit, and it is the one here that most rewards being worn with plain clothes. Against a heavily worked saree it has to compete; against plain cotton or silk it looks like the real thing.

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.

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.