All That Glitters

ENTERING A BUZZING CAFÉ in north Bengaluru, it is hard to miss a 20-something at a corner table, her laptop open, her cappuccino getting cold. She wears a carefully curated white-and-beige outfit, but what draws you in at first glance is the stack of bracelets on her left wrist. Gold-toned and timeless, some of them are delicate as threads of spun light, while the wider cuffs, solid and unapologetic, anchor the ensemble. The tiny details on them feel intentional but not precious. The quiet sparkle, the whisper of sophistication—it is who she is. Her jewellery could be Cartier. It could be from an In­stagram label. It could also be Palmonas, the rising star of India’s demi-fine jewellery market. “I have worn this stack for a month now and I am not tired of it. Sometimes I might add a fancier bangle to dress it up. I like that it doesn’t scratch or poke—it feels as easy as slipping on a silk blouse,” says Anaya Manchanda, a 29-year-old corporate lawyer. A T-bar necklace sits above her collarbone and her sculptural rings can migrate from coffee meetings to date nights without missing a beat. A delicate string of pearls with a dangling moissanite charm is paired with a black Apple Watch on her right wrist. “Until a couple of years ago I had to beg friends and family to bring back demi-fine pieces from the US and the UK but there is more to choose from in India today than there is overseas,” says Manchanda, who is proud of not buying a single piece of precious jewellery for her Goa wedding last summer. “I have invested that money in stocks,” she says, tucking her hair behind her ears adorned with glossy gold vermeil hoops.

Demi-fine jewellery—jewellery that exists in a liminal space between the opu­lence of fine pieces and the ephemerality of costume—has emerged as the accessory of a generation. It is affordable but aspirational, subtle but stylish, and designed to slip into the rhythms of our daily lives. For Millenni­als and Gen Z, the allure of demi-fine lies not only in its wearability but in its ability to reflect a contemporary ethos: accessible luxury that doesn’t demand compromise. Hand-made from quality metals like sterling silver and surgical steel, plated with a thick and sturdy coating of gold, and often topped with an anti-tarnish coating, this jewellery speaks the language of permanence without the price tag, and comes with the promise that it will keep up with you, will endure morning yoga sessions and unrelenting monsoons, the endless parade of festivals and meet-ups. This durability is also symbolic. It mirrors the aspirations of a generation that refuses to be tethered to the past but still craves its elegance. They want jew­ellery that reminds them of their mothers’ gold, but without the weight—literal or emotional—of inheritance. They want pieces that feel timeless but live in the now, that shine without screaming for attention. They want jewellery they can mix and layer until it be­comes an extension of self—beautiful, ever-shifting and imperfect.

“Unlike so-called imitation jewellery that is made of brass or cheap alloys, we use 925 sterling silver or surgical steel, which are inert and won’t react upon contact with skin. Flash plating, which is what most silver or brass jewellery brands do, tarnishes in a few uses and has to be kept away from water and perfume. But in vermeil, the plating is thick and done in a different way. Imagine applying a coat of paint on an unfinished wall versus applying putty and primer and then painting several coats. Our process involves buffing the metal thrice, then silver-polishing it thrice and finally adding a layer of gold plating so that it looks and feels just like gold,” says Pallavi Mohadikar, a 35-year-old from Pune who co-founded Palmo­nas with her orthopaedician husband Amol Patwari in 2022. The average value of an order on the Palmonas website was ₹1,200 two years ago. Now it is ₹3,000 and projected to touch ₹4,500 in the next couple of months. With five offline stores and five more in the pipeline, Palmonas is one of the fastest-growing jewellery brands in India, and much of this growth has resulted from actor Shraddha Kapoor’s endorsement. “For months, she was our cus­tomer and we didn’t know it. We would get bulk orders of 15-20 pieces worth ₹40,000-50,000 from a certain ‘S Kapoor’. Then we saw her wearing our jewellery and reached out and brought her in as a cofounder,” says Mohadikar. The brand has since grown 10 times and is now looking to open its website to international orders.

With dozens of Instagram stores aiming to satisfy the mod­ern craving for versatility, legacy brands that are taking note and pivoting to minimal and durable designs, and fashion-forward luxury marketplaces like Tanzire that are stocking global labels including Missoma and Inxsky, the demi-fine category in India, which only came into being a couple of years ago, has well and truly exploded. “For a generation raised on fast fashion but yearning for sustainability, demi-fine jewellery offers the perfect compromise. It’s an investment without over-commitment, a kind of luxury that feels tangible and guilt-free,” says Shravanti T, a 30-year-old architect-in-training from Mumbai. “I have always wanted to wear minimal iconic pieces like the Cartier Love bracelet and the Alham­bra necklace by Van Cleef and Arpels that are out of reach for most women, but now there are half a dozen Instagram brands that have replicated these designs in vermeil for under ₹5,000.”

For years, Jaipur has been the heart of global demi-fine jewel­lery, its workshops humming with the rhythm of artisans who transform raw materials into treasures. Behind the polished piec­es of Missoma, Monica Vinader, or even Mejuri, there is often the silent labour of Jaipur’s artisans, but now, a shift is happening. The story is no longer one of global brands exporting Indian craft, it is Indian brands reclaiming that craft, shaping it not for export but for India. Labels like Zariin and Isharya have led the charge, creating high-quality gold-plated jewellery designed with the Indian consumer in mind. Now, a new wave of affordable Indian demi-fine jewellery has emerged as a quiet rebellion against the exclusivity of global luxury and the pomp of traditional jewellery. It borrows from the restrained sophistication of international brands while layering in motifs and textures that feel distinctly Indian: filigree inspired by Mughal architecture, gemstones cut in colours reminiscent of Rajasthan’s sunsets, designs that nod to tradition without being beholden to it. The result is jewellery that feels effortless but carries the weight of centuries of craft.

Thanks to independent demi-fine brands like Delta Charms and Elinor Jewels, the modern aesthete has found a new way to connect with jewellery. It is no longer a gift from a father to a daughter; it is self-chosen, self-owned, a declaration of independence that sparkles on the wrist or glints from the earlobe. And it is made by women for women. “We have offered consultancy services to at least 50 clients in the past two years and we are getting more and more enquiries from young women entrepreneurs who want to launch their own demi-fine private labels,” says 39-year-old Vishal Vighasia, of Variation, a 15-year-old jewellery design and manufacturing com­pany in Surat that works with global clients. “For the domestic mar­ket, where we were manufacturing artificial fashion jewellery with gold plating, we are now focusing on good quality products like vermeil jewellery and gold jewellery with lab-grown diamonds that offer great value for money,” says Vighasia, a self-taught jeweller. Lab-grown diamonds, which cost just about a tenth of their mined counterparts, have quickly become the darlings of a new global aes­thetic and a new market valued at $15 billion. They are molecularly identical to mined diamonds, yet their sparkle is untainted by envi­ronmental degradation or the shadow of conflict. In India, where diamonds have long been symbols of wealth, romance, and status, the emergence of lab-grown diamonds signals a tectonic shift. No longer confined to the vaults of legacy jewellers, diamonds are now being reimagined for a younger generation.

When Prime Minister Narendra Modi presented the then First Lady of the US Jill Biden with a lab-grown diamond during his 2023 state visit, the stone, large and luminous, was not merely a gift— it was a statement. India, long celebrated as the land of intricate goldwork and mined diamonds, now stands at the forefront of a jewellery revolution. The lab-grown diamond is more than a trend; it is a symbol of progress, a bijoux de l’avenir that reflects the country’s ambition and ingenuity. “We are witnessing one of the biggest disruptions in the jewellery industry—an upheaval,” says Lisa Mukhedkar, founder of Aukera, a lab-grown jewellery brand. “A lab-grown diamond is not the cheaper diamond, it is better jewel­lery than you could have ever hoped for. Diamonds have never been great investments—they were a desire, not a need, and women were forced to settle for tiny yellowish stones because the prices of mined diamonds were artificially high. Suddenly, now there is a way bet­ter product—with flawless diamonds, colours and custom cuts— and the opportunities for design are boundless. Quality and design will be the drivers of this shift to lab-grown, not only the price.” Aukera started up in 2023 and with their eight stores are doubling revenues month-on-month. Walk into any of their stores and the manager will guide you through how diamonds are grown inside a reactor in a matter of weeks and show you cuts you have likely never seen before, including a signature solitaire with 161 cuts. The Kohinoor, in comparison, has 66 facets. “Diamond jewellery is a high-involvement category led by design and well-adjusted women who are buying lab-grown for themselves know that they are mak­ing the smarter choice, not a compromise,” says Mukhedkar.

Like lab-grown diamonds, which got a stamp of approval with Modi’s symbolic present, the popularity of demi-fine jew­ellery has come on the back of celebrities, who are seen as the ultimate arbiters of taste in today’s world, endorsing many home-grown brands. For Gen Z, luxury is no longer about the unreachable glam­our of couture, it is about the almost-ac­cessible kind—the demi-fine cuffs we see on the wrists of Deepika Padukone and Malaika Arora and the hoops we have seen Alia Bhatt and Kriti Sanon sport at premieres. “If it’s good enough for Parineeti Chopra to wear at her wedding, it’s good enough for me—that was the sentiment that we saw driving our sales when she chose a headband that I had designed,” says Dhara Chhatbar, a 33-year-old ex-investment banker from Chennai, who launched Ishhaara, a handcrafted jewellery label, in 2018. “I was doing it as a side gig but the business grew so much that I had to quit my day job,” says Chhatbar. With sales of ₹25-30 lakh a month, the label offers bridal as well as minimal demi-fine pieces. Part of the allure of demi-fine, she says, is to be able to wear daily pieces that have been carefully crafted. “It is a very liberating feeling. My wedding ring, which cost ₹8-10 lakh, sits in the locker but I have got a new lab-grown diamond ring of the same size that costs ₹1 lakh and I wear it and admire it every day,” she says. Both demi-fine jewellery and lab-grown stones are metaphors for the world we want to live in: innovative, sustainable, and beautiful in ways that feel honest. They embody a contemporary paradox—the desire for the eternal, but on our own terms. And they are pieces to be worn and cherished, not as symbols of wealth, but as reflections of individuality.

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