Cool Collectors: Calming Luxury Jewellery to Alleviate Anxiety 

We all feel anxious from time to time, so how do you deal with it? If your go-to self-soothing stim is to fiddle with your hair, snap an elastic band on your wrist, or lean into the healing powers of nature, then we have a few alternative ideas for you from a creative cohort of jewellers dedicated to designing functional calming jewellery that doesn’t compromise on looks or luxury. Rachael Taylor dives into the soothing world of jewels that ease a troubled mind…

Charlotte Garnett was in her final year of studies at the legendary London art college Central Saint Martins when she broke down in front of her tutor. The aspiring jewellery designer had been failing to connect with her work and had been diagnosed with anxiety. It had all become too much. After listening to Garnett explain what was troubling her, tutor Naomi Filmer had some sage advice that helped her through those times and continues to inspire her creativity today. “She said, ‘You’ve gone on about how you like to work autobiographically and express your emotions, so why aren’t you doing that?’,” remembers Garnett. “It was like, oh yeah… why aren’t I doing that?”

For Garnet, who is neurodivergent, that meant leaning into her anxiety instead of trying to cover it up. She started to create jewellery that was at once beautiful and offered a functionality to calm and soothe the emotions of the wearer. “One of the things I was taught in therapy when I was younger was to keep an elastic band on my wrist and ping the band to ground me mentally, to interrupt [negative] thoughts and impulses of self-harm,” she shares. “However, it’s very conspicuous and really not stylish at all. The whole basis of my work is to find something you actually want to wear, because there’s no reason why we shouldn’t have luxurious and desirable and beautiful objects that are beneficial to us.”

Her signature collection Touchstone mimics the benefits of the rubber band ping, but with precious elements. She creates rings set with pearls and gemstones that have been sharpened to a point, allowing the wearer to press onto them in times of stress. She has also sharpened gold into points to create earrings and pendants that can be subtly pressed when grounding is required.

Other Charlott Garnett collections speak to different types of anxiety relief. Cure for the Itch is a luxurious upgrade on fidget tools with kinetic objects made with ebony wood and gold leaf trapped in resin – including an homage to a packet of cigarettes to soothe those trying to give up the habit, allowing them to pluck out a cigarette-like shape from the packet and twiddle until the urge passes. Her collection of Hepworth rings made with shapely marble are designed to quell the impulse she often feels – as we all do – to touch what we are not supposed to when walking around a museum.

Garnett’s work has found many fans within the neurodivergent community, of which she is part, but she believes the appeal of her tactile work is broad. “Tapping your nails on things, twiddling your hair, fiddling with a button, biting your nails,” reels off Garnett, listing common responses to stress that we all display. “All of those are actually stimming behaviours, which are self-soothing.”

Jewellery designer Marla Aaron is also a master of self-soothing jewels. Her collection Fiddling Series encourages touch and play. The Diamond Pins charm is a precious take on the pin art boxes that we all found curiously relaxing to plunge out hands and faces into as children. Her Trundle bracelets and rings have spinnable barrels. The Pulley pendants work in just the way their name suggests.

“All of our jewellery could be [used] for anxiety, it’s all fidgety,” says Aaron. “The very premise of our pieces is play, distraction, procrastination, even. We want you to get lost in your jewellery.”

Other jewellers catering to those who like to fiddle, include Zeemou Zeng, whose work centres around kinetic elements such as gemstones that roll side to side safely within gold tracks. Drutis’s Solomon’s Rings have a similar style, with the added surprise that when the gems move, they reveal calming messages including ‘This too shall pass’. And if you prefer to stretch rather than roll your jewellery in moments of anxiety, Fullord has a wonderful collection called Ariane of gold and diamond pieces designed to flex.

Jewellery being used to battle anxiety might seem zeitgeisty, and a sign of a time marred by rising levels of mental health issues, but, if you look back through history, this has long been its role. Certain gemstones have historically been chosen for specific protective qualities: to ward off negative energy (amethyst), to protect from heartbreak (garnet); as protection from the perils of the open ocean (aquamarine).

Ananya Malhotra, the designer behind the Ananya jewellery brand, is a firm believer in the power of gemstones to soothe. Ananya’s Chakra bracelets feature smooth, round cuts of gems that can be worn close to the skin to soothe, ground and fortify. “We find that anxiety is so personal, and one person’s needs are so different from the other, so we love to handle each client’s needs individually,” says Malhotra when asked which gems she would prescribe for anxiety. “If it is something really complex, we have a healer whom we consult. This allows them to have specific guidance on the beads that we use for the bracelets.”

So often with anxiety, depression, or long-term disorders such as bi-polar, moods fluctuate. One day a calming influence might be required, the next a bolt of energy. In recognition of the constant flux of our mental health, Matilde Mozzanega has developed a system that allows her clients to switch up the interchangeable gemstones in her Chromo-Dope rings, necklaces and earrings to suit their daily needs.

“I am fascinated by the power of jewellery as a healing and wellness source, as a modern take on the ancient tradition of jewellery as talisman,” says Mozzanega, who was inspired to create the collection by the #postyourpill social media movement to destigmatise treatment for mental health conditions. “I craft wellness jewellery with chromotherapy and crystal therapy, creating talismanic protection for those seeking to amplify their self-care journey. The wearer is encouraged to tune in daily to understand their chromatic, spiritual needs.”

To demonstrate that the gold Chromo-Dope designs, which are sold with sets of up to six gemstones, are not about ‘switching up your look’, but rather ‘switching up your mood’, the jewels and gems are sealed in blister packs to look like pills. Written on the medial inspired box is the text: “Remedy jewels for intuitive self care”.

Whether you choose to pop a gemstone, fidget with a kinetic jewel, or ground yourself with a sharpened gold point, jewellery can be just the medicine we need to help calm our nerves in moments of heightened emotion. And, thanks to the ingenuity of a new switched-on cache of designers unafraid to highlight good mental health practices, we can look stylish while doing it. I feel myself calming already.