Memory Lane

Adorn London ran a sweet, and timely, piece on holiday jewellery last week. The website's editor, Juliet, asked various contributors to wax lyrical about the pieces they packed for their hols, or – in my case – my brother's wedding in San Sebastian, Spain. Click here to read the full story.

Here's what I wrote:
"I’m taking five bone bangles from India, a pair of marcasite drop earrings from my Spanish great grandma, my great aunty’s gold wedding ring (worn on my left forefinger), a gold and black ‘hip hop’ chain necklace by Florian and my trusty gold hoop earrings."

This is the best I could manage on photos:

To elaborate: the earrings belonged to great grandma, then grandma, then mum and now me. My brother was married in the church in the grounds of the school that my great grandma, grandma and mum all attended. It's on a hill overlooking the beautiful city of San Sebastian in the Basque country. The earrings are silver metal embellished with marcasite - they look a bit like lace – and it meant a lot to me to wear them on such a special day.


From the sublime to the ridiculous... I bought these bangles in various Delhi markets when I went to visit my friend Chrissy in India a few years back. I love them because not only do they look fab and elicit lots of compliments, they did well to make it back to the UK in one piece. Kind-hearted Chrissy had adopted two street dogs and these bangles were the only souvenirs of my month-long trip to escape the strays' obsession with swallowing everything in sight.

My proudest purchase had been some gorgeous North Indian beaded necklaces until they disappeared into thin air one day. I found the the beads – minus the string, and bleached by the sun – up on the roof a week later after. How they got there, and the intestinal odyssey they underwent, needs no further elaboration here.