Concert Couture: Reimagining the Taylor Swift Friendship Bracelet Craze in Fine Jewellery

The mega-star singer and songwriter Taylor Swift has brought jewellery front and centre to her record-breaking Eras Tour, with super fans starting a tradition of building and exchanging beaded bracelets during her concerts. But what if the essence of this friendship bracelet trend could be reworked to include diamonds and precious gemstones? Here are some fine jewellery suggestions to help you “make the whole place shimmer” this summer.

Taylor Swift has become a household name, with hits like ‘Love Story’, ‘Blank Space’, and ‘Bad Blood’ often playing in the background of teenagers’ and parents’ lives. The lyrics to her catchiest tunes have become the motifs of the friendship bracelets fans make and trade during her concerts. The trend started with the lyrics to Swift’s song ‘You’re On Your Own, Kid’, where she sings: “So, make the friendship bracelets, take the moment and taste it.” Fans took these lyrics to heart, and this trend has become a beloved tradition for concertgoers. Exchanging these homemade jewels allows fans to connect and share their passion for Swift’s music creatively and uniquely, accessorising their concert outfits.

We love a jewellery trend, especially one that embraces friendship and sharing. Friendship bracelets have a history dating back centuries, with origins in various ancient cultures. They were first created by indigenous tribes in Central and South America, using knotting techniques with coloured fibres, symbolising love and affection. This tradition endures today, embodying love, friendship, and loyalty. Many fine jewellery designers draw inspiration from the versatile friendship bracelet, creating pieces from gold and precious gems that mimic these beaded jewels in a more glamorous style. Here are a few brands we think will add a bejewelled touch to your Taylor Swift concert experience.

ANANYA Fine Jewellery Chakra Bracelets

ANANYA Fine Jewellery’s Chakra bracelet collection is a beaded piece of fine jewellery that is perfect for those of us who want a stack of soft pastel colours with a touch of diamond sparkle. The international Indian designer is inspired by her heritage to create this kaleidoscopic healing gemstone jewellery collection to bring positive energy and happiness to all who wear them. In the last few years, Ananya has noticed a rise in clients purchasing her Chakra bracelets for friends, moonstone, amethyst, malachite and rose quartz being the most popular: “The beauty of a chakra bracelet is that you can personalise the bracelet based on the needs of your close friends, making it a real token of friendship”. The piece involves choosing a gemstone combination and then the bar, which can be in full diamond pavé for an extra dose of sparkle or with sapphires for even more colour. A stack of these is guaranteed to bring colour, positive energy and glamour to any Taylor Swift concert.

Bea Bongiasca WOW & Tubini Bracelets

There seems to be no limit to the imagination of Milanese designer Bea Bongiasca. Her playful, colourful and often daring approach to fine jewellery design allows her to create whimsical yet beautifully crafted pieces of fine jewellery from her Milan-based studio that have proven extremely popular with T-Swift fans the world over. The powerful and unique designs of her WOW and Tubini bracelets offer the perfect combination of playful and precious to a concert wrist stack. The WOW bracelets are crafted from custom-cut rock crystal beads that are strung over cords of colourful, vibrant thread spanning every colour of the rainbow. They can also be topped off with a gold and enamel initial pendant or a Bea Flower, dangling from the clasp if you are looking for an added dose of individuality. Her Tubini bracelets also offer the most colourful of wrist candy options. Designed with hand-painted enamel and brushed gold beads to create an endless array of warm and shimmering colourful bracelets, these tubular pieces are easy to stack or wear alone as a statement piece.

Carolina Bucci FORTE Beads Collection

Inspired by her family holiday trips to Forte dei Marmi where she and her children spend endless hours on the beach making beaded bracelets for one another, Italian designer Carolina  Bucci decided to bring this endearing and emotional bonding opportunity to her loyal clientele by creating the FORTE Beads collection – a build your bracelet kit in which clients have the chance to design their bracelets with a selection of 30 vibrant hard stone beads in preset Rainbow colours and a Lurex cord in the colour of their choice. The beads include magnesite, lemon agate, cornelian, coral, tiger’s eye, peach aventurine, blush coral, rhodonite, chrysoprase, jade, hematite, rock crystal, angelite, turquoise, lapis lazuli and amethyst – allowing clients to choose from the entire rainbow spectrum of colours in a variety of hues and tones. Clients can make their bracelets by threading the beads onto the cord and tying it to their preferred length. What’s more, the knots can be undone so that you can experiment and play with different bead combinations as often as you would like.

Picchiotti Xpandable™ Reversible Bracelets

Founded in Valenza, an ancient Italian village known for jewellery-making, Picchiotti is an iconic Italian jewellery brand that specialises in highly complex jewellery-making techniques that allow its pieces to stand out from the crowd. Enter the Reversible bracelet – a series of pieces that combine two bracelets into one design thanks to revolutionary invisible technology that allows the pieces to expand, contract and flip seamlessly, taking one apparent piece to entirely new heights in one simple movement. Available in coloured gemstones as well as a dozen different ceramic colours, these bracelets offer style flexibility as well as comfort for any concertgoer as they seamlessly transform from hand-etched gold links to mother-of-pearl and diamond pavé or turquoise and even red coral. What we love about these bracelets is the option of a subtle diamond pavé included on at least one side of every and the various tone combinations of rose, white and yellow gold. These pieces play with colour at every level of fine jewellery materials – from the gold frames to the stones and ceramic they are set with.

Venyx World Terra Mater Bracelets

Lastly, for a bracelet that is beautiful, precious and does good, look to Venyx World’s collaboration with blue and circular economy initiative BlueCycle, who together have created bracelets from which proceeds are committed to combatting marine plastic pollution. Named Terra Mater (Mother Earth), these bracelets are inspired by ancient Roman mythology, in which Terra Mater symbolises the personification of the earth, making this collection not only beautiful but also a meaningful fine jewellery dedication to sustainability. Through a series of processes, BlueCycle can transform discarded pieces of ocean plastic into a desirable design. Greek fine jewellery designer Eugenie Niarchos fell in love with the idea, deciding to collaborate on two bracelets with the company, one pink and one blue. The pink version features a mix of Rose Quartz beads, Venetian glass beads, and freshwater pearls, with a pink recycled ocean plastic set with white sapphires in yellow gold on recycled plastic cord, whilst the blue version features Lapis Lazuli beads instead. These colourful and fun bracelets are examples of how the fine jewellery world is embracing environmental conservation and protection to create pieces that are beautiful but also meaningful.

Explore these brands to create your personalised stack of fine jewellery friendship bracelets. Colourful, meaningful, precious, and fun, these pieces will last a lifetime and make you feel dazzling at any Taylor Swift concert. Let us know which ones you choose!