Vintage square motif enamel earrings

Vintage square motif enamel earrings

Cream, with a run of silver straight through the middle.

The shape arrives first — a soft square with rounded corners, gently domed, filled edge to edge in off-white enamel. Then across the centre there's a channel, and set down into it, a row of slim silver bars laid parallel to one another. It's an architect's kind of detail: a solid plane, then an interruption, then solid again. Nothing decorative has been added. The interest is entirely in how the two materials meet.

Enamel is more difficult than it looks, and this pair shows what a good hand can do with it. The surface has to be built up evenly across a curve, without thinning at the edges, without a single ripple or bubble, and then finished until it reads as one continuous skin. On this pair it's flawless, and the colour is a particular one — not a bright white but a warm ivory, closer to bone or to old piano keys, which is a far kinder colour against skin.

And that colour is the surprise. The 1980s was the decade of saturated jewellery: cobalt, emerald, hot pink, glossy black, worn large and worn deliberately. This pair was made at exactly that scale, with the sturdy comfort-padded clip backs that mark the period's better workshops — and then finished in the quietest colour available. Someone wanted the presence without the volume. It's the reason a piece like this still feels entirely wearable now, when so much from those years does not.

At 5g they sit flat and steady on the lobe, covering it neatly, and the clips have real cushioning, so a long evening in them is no trouble. No piercing needed.

Wear them with a white shirt and let the two whites differ slightly — that's a lovely thing to look at. They're just as good against black, and against cream, and honestly against most things, which is the quiet advantage of an earring that has decided not to bring a colour of its own.

Material: Brass, silver metal plating, coloured enamel
Era: 1980s
Measurements: approx 2cm x 2cm
Weight: 5g
Fittings: Clip-on with comfort pads
Condition: In very good vintage condition.
Made in, or sourced from: Australia

International Shipping:
All orders are shipped from Japan with tracking.

Asia: Shipping ¥3,800 / approx. 7–10 business days
Australia: Shipping AUD 30 / approx. 7–10 business days
Europe: Shipping €29 / approx. 7–15 business days

Delivery times exclude weekends and Japanese public holidays.
Customs duties or import taxes, if applicable, are the responsibility of the recipient.

Turning

Leaves turn. The light goes low and amber. Nothing announces itself — you simply notice, one morning, that the air has changed.

Turning is the autumn chapter of Passage. Four days, four quiet scenes from the weeks when summer lets go, and sixteen pieces drawn from the colours and the air of that shift.

Nothing here is dressed for the season. Some pieces are ornate, some almost plain. They were simply waiting when the light changed, held until now by hands we'll never know.

However you move through these days, we hope something here finds its way to you.