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Charm bracelets are the jewelery equivalent of wearing your heart on your sleeve. You’ve chosen to express yourself via an array of jangling gems, each of which have been carefully selected to say something about your personality or identity—and the way you want other people to perceive you. If you grew up in the ’90s and Noughties, you might have dabbled in DIY and made them in your childhood or teens, or yearned after styles from the likes of Pandora or Links of London.
Blink, baby, because it feels like we’ve been transported right back there: Gen-Zs are unboxing Pandora charm bracelets on TikTok, friends are visiting “charm bars” as a hang-out activity, and I’ve recently spotted lots of people (both IRL and online), with stacked charms on their arms, sprouting from their handbags and even decorating their footwear. From nostalgic Italian charm bracelets to delicate metal trinkets, it feels like charms are everywhere right now.
Ian Charms founder and jewelery maker to the stars, Lisa Sahakian, has seen huge success with her nostalgic gems. Lately, she admits she’s been “clinically addicted” to Brat (Charli XCX’s fizzy, feral, party-girl album), and was inspired to create a new design, the ‘Charli braxcxlet’, complete with dice, heart, alien, motorbike and spiky gel ball beads (remember those?), prompting sales to go “nuts.” “It’s probably been our best selling item ever, which reassures me that Ian Charms customers share interests with myself and the brand, and that feels amazing,” reveals Sahakian. One of the Brat muses, Julia Fox–referred to in the track ‘360’ via the lyrics “I’m everywhere, I’m so Julia”–is a fan of Ian Charms’s designs, and even showed one of the necklaces in her British Vogue In The Bag video.
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Searches for charms on the whole have been up 150 per cent in the past six months, according to Lyst, with charm bracelets from MM6 Maison Margiela (up 300 per cent week-on-week) and Dior (up 750 per cent month-on-month), among the most popular on the shopping app. Ssense is brimming with playful styles from Justine Clenquet, Chopova Lowena and Marc Jacobs, which would look great photographed on a lo-fi digital camera à la Brat, while social media suggests plenty of people are enjoying making their own. Italian charm bracelets–customisable square charms connected by links, rather than being attached to a chain–have also proven particularly popular.
Beyond their teenybopper appeal, charm bracelets have a storied history in luxury fashion. They were commonplace on Chanel’s runways in the 1990s–often debuted alongside playful chain belts and layered necklaces–while maximalist jewelery has long been a Versace signature (look out for vintage Medusa and coin-adorned bracelets).
If you’re not planning on crafting your own beaded creation, scroll on to see some of the best charm bracelets available now. You’ll also find some of the best at vintage markets, so be sure to scour those, too.
