Sunburst Medallion Payal with Stone 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

This is the most worked piece in the anklet range and the one to choose if you want the payal to be the jewellery rather than the accompaniment to it. At its centre is a round medallion: a large cabochon held in a collet ringed with tiny metal grains, and around that a circle of pear-cut stones alternating between the colour of the piece and clear white. The whole disc is edged in granulation, and a single teardrop stone hangs from its lower rim so there is something that moves when you walk.

Running out from the medallion on both sides are small floral links — three pear-cut stones arranged as petals, again alternating coloured and white — joined to each other by clusters of soldered metal beads. The effect is of a line of flowers climbing round the ankle towards a single larger bloom, which is a very old arrangement in Indian ornament and the same logic that governs a necklace with a central pendant.

The alternation of coloured and clear stones is worth noticing. A piece set entirely in one colour reads as a block; alternating with white breaks the line into individual flowers and makes the whole thing look lighter and more valuable than its price. It is the cheapest trick in jewellery design and still the most effective.

What it is made of

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.

Shades and stock

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.

When to wear it

Four colourways are stocked. Ruby is the deep pink-red shown in the main photograph and the dressiest of the four. Green is a true bottle green that reads almost black at a distance and suits a gold-bordered saree. Baby Pink is pale and milky and the easiest to wear in daylight. Multi sets a different colour in each flower, which is the traditional navratna arrangement and the one that will go with the widest range of clothes.

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.

Wear this one where it will be seen — a wedding, a reception, a festival, with a saree or a lehenga, with bare ankles or an anklet-length trouser. It is too ornate to disappear under a hem, and it is not the anklet to wear with shoes that rub.

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.

How to care for it

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.