Jewels that will leave you drooling

Anyone for an onion ring? Or a bamboo-steamer pendant filled with carved-jade bao buns? To say that food-inspired jewellery has never been hotter feels like undercooking it somewhat. Everyone from collectors and connoisseurs to gourmands and TikTok girlies is being tempted by a banquet of edibles. 

Edamame beans and exotic fruit motifs, lobsters and wishbones, chillies, bagels, sushi and sweets… All play a part in the foodie mood that’s in fashion. While Loewe, Jacquemus and Schiaparelli lean into surrealist references, retailers such as Browns are using culinary art in their campaigns. The fascination spans the past – see Anne Hathaway’s spaghetti-esque archive Valentino dress at the 2023 Fashion Awards (“I’ve always dreamed about being pasta,” she mused) – and present: Alaïa described one of its freshest couture offerings, a dress sculpted from delicate layers of wool, as a millefeuille.

Food is so evocative – jewellery can pin down that emotion

Half the fun is in the delicious microtrend-crossover potential. Eclectic Grandpa-core? Help yourself to one of Julia Obermaier’s Werther’s Original-inspired pendants. Mob wife? That calls for Jessica “day diamonds” McCormack’s pasta-inspired collection: sultry ribbons of tagliatelle replete with sparkle. Liberty has an own-brand collection featuring peppercorns, while Cassandra Goad’s latest suite creates chains from abstracted patisserie and impresses the texture of a fresh rustic baguette onto rings. Former food stylist Lauren Harwell Godfrey of Harwell Godfrey has channelled her passion into teeny tins of caviar and a three-part tequila pendant complete with salt-shaker and lime-wedge charms; and jeweller Qiang (Helen) Li recently made a bespoke necklace that outlines the process of making dim sum.

Jessica McCormack gold Spaghetti necklace, £20,000

Tiffany & Co gold and pearl Peapod brooch by Jean Schlumberger, £29,000

Harwell Godfrey gold, diamond and mother-of-pearl Caviar pendant, £7,803

Annoushka gold and diamond Fish Bones charm pendant, £3,200

Annoushka Ducas, founder-designer of Annoushka, is no stranger to a food feature – her first and favourite being the original fishbone cufflinks she created in tribute to her mother’s seafood business, which she took over before launching Links of London. Even she is amazed by the current appetite, which is most striking when clients commission her bespoke My Life in Seven Charms pieces. 

“Of all the objects or symbols a person could choose to represent their life, it’s now very, very common for one or more of them to be about food, be it a plate, a peanut or an avocado,” she says. “Food is so evocative. It’s all about emotion, memories, important moments. When you think about those occasions it’s not just about the aesthetics, but smell, taste, touch. As the emotion around that memory evolves, we find ourselves wanting to pin it down… and jewellery can do that.” It comes at a time when comfort-seeking is paramount: a hybrid of “little treat” culture, as Gen Z turns to smaller, dopamine-rich pleasures, and the much-discussed “cult of cute”, with its attendant escapism. Added to that, asserts Ducas, food is becoming bound to our sense of identity. “I think increasingly the things we eat reflect elements of our temperament and passions, but also what we stand for.” (This is borne out in a recent survey by Ketchum where 61 per cent of Gen Z participants said they have felt pressure to eat a certain way to communicate their identity and beliefs, and 63 per cent believe their food choices need to signal their health, values and political beliefs.)

Thank goodness then that the hamburger ring that catapulted Lebanese-Brazilian designer Nadine Ghosn to design stardom – Beyoncé and Pharrell are fans – is also available as a veggie burger. Its six stacking rings, which can be worn individually, include a top sesame-seed bun with ketchup detail, a veggie burger, an onion ring in princess-cut diamonds, tomato, lettuce and bottom bun with mustard detail. Oh, and it’s gluten-free. 

Julia Obermaier gold amber’s Original pendant, €1,920

Nadine Ghosn gold, diamond, ruby and sapphire Veggie Burger ring, $20,880

Food and feasting have been a creative preoccupation since time immemorial (pomegranates, persimmons and pineapples have long signified prosperity, abundance, even decadence). But it was a craze for naturalism in the Victorian era, says Henry Bailey of Christie’s London jewellery department, that brought fruit to prominence, developed “in part to demonstrate the technical skill of the goldsmiths, and in part for the strong symbolic connotations of nature”. Jewels celebrated grapes and the vine, “symbolic of abundance, rebirth, fertility” and their Biblical connections.

Dolce & Gabbana Alta Gioielleria gold, tourmaline, emerald and tsavorite-garnet necklace, POA

Chanel gold, diamond, sapphire and Platinum Les Blés de Chanel brooch, POA

Chaumet gold, platinum and diamond Epi de Blé earrings, POA

Van Cleef & Arpels yellow- and rose-gold, diamond, spessartite-garnet, red-jasper and lapis lazuli Anfora clip, POA

Recently, Cartier created a one-off candy-inspired necklace for Timothée Chalamet to wear for the Wonka premiere. It was a clever spin on its revered, colour-saturated art deco Tutti Frutti signature, still one of the most sought-after “fruit” jewel categories at auction. But, just as the maximalist Peter Carl Fabergé once carved a potato from pink agate (yes, really), it’s still more typical in high jewellery to celebrate the literal stuff of life. Chanel and Chaumet employ the wheat emblem, while vines and the Roman horn of plenty feature in Van Cleef’s Le Grand Tour collection. Dolce & Gabbana’s Green Gold – Olive Oil Alta Gioielleria is an homage to the plump olives of Pugliese orchards.

The lighter mood in fine jewellery owes a lot to the influence of masterful contemporary art-jewellers such as JAR and Hemmerle, who marry impeccable high craftsmanship with wit and whimsy. So too the work of Suzanne Syz, who went full-on pop with her Campbell’s Soup Can earrings; Cora Sheibani, whose iconic repertoire of linzer torte, gugelhopf cakes and moulded jelly rings has been joined by lentils; and conceptual artists such as Gavin Turk, whose iconic bitten Rich Tea biscuit and apple-core pendants (of various varieties) reside in Louisa Guinness’s new Kensington gallery, making the statement, Guinness says, “that everything has value”.

Suzanne Syz Art Jewels pink-gold, titanium, ceramic and diamond Campbell’s Soup Can earrings, POA

Cassandra Goad gold Baguette du pain ring, from £2,660

Cédric Grolet x Nadine Ghosn gold limited-edition Croissant charm, $6,880

Cora Sheibani rose-gold, sapphire and spinel Mixed Berry Tart ring, POA

Ghosn, who has collaborated with pâtissier extraordinaire Cédric Grolet on limited-edition, elaborately sculpted pendants featuring an 18ct-gold croissant and a sweet “pain au chic”, draws a parallel between chefs’ and jewellers’ exacting standards. Yet, despite having dabbled with haute cuisine, the pop art burger is still her touchstone. 

“The idea was to celebrate a unifying, everyday thing; to valorise it by glamorising it, to make people look at it again,” she says. “A burger is humble but we all have such strong feelings about it. The way you take your burger is so personal. There are so many layers.” It also symbolises creative curiosity for her, the notion of “staying hungry”. So where next? Perhaps the food that best expresses her personality? “Mmm. Cereal.” Whatever comes, choose wisely: it’s a moment on the lips, a lifetime on the wrists.