Counting down the days until Dec. 25 is often associated with opening a window in a cardboard calendar to reveal a festive scene, or perhaps a chocolate. In recent years that traditional item, often called an Advent calendar, has received a luxury makeover.
“What could be more wonderful,” said Marisa Hordern, the founder and creative director of the jewelry brand Missoma, “than opening it up, you know, to get jewelry!”
In a recent Instagram Story from the British brand, a pair of hands with dark red-painted nails rummages through the drawers and little dated boxes in the two-tone blue chest to reveal the 2024 holiday selections: earrings, necklaces and bracelets. Rings, Ms. Hordern noted, aren’t included because they would require sizing.
“It’s your starter kit,” she said. “It’s pieces we’re saying you’re never going to want to take off.”
Missoma offers three variations: Silver, with 12 silver plated and sterling silver pieces, at 365 pounds ($471); Gold, with 12 pieces in 18-karat gold vermeil and gold plated, at £395; and Solid Gold, with six pieces in 14-karat gold and diamonds, at £1,295.
Ms. Hordern said she had been inspired by the beauty industry’s Advent calendar success when she introduced Missoma’s first jewelry calendar in 2019. She was not the only one.
In 2020, Astrid & Miyu, a demi-fine brand in London known for its stackable jewelry styles, debuted a calendar with just 12 windows. Jade Lacey, the senior product development manager, said the brand knew at the time that its “customers were looking to us for some guidance and some inspiration on how they might, kind of, curate pieces” and had been impressed by the way that beauty calendars gave customers “a chance to try different things.”
This year, the brand is offering five styles, from £345 to £995, depending on the number of calendar windows (4, 12 and 24) and the amount of precious metals used to create the pieces.
“We want, like, all of our iconic pieces to be in there,” said Ms. Lacey, referring, for example, to its “huggies” earrings. And she noted that the calendars’ content now is selected with less of an emphasis on trends and more on the customers’ needs, the idea that the items could be “a foundation for their jewelry wardrobe.”
The calendars have been so popular, she said, that the brand opens a waiting list for the next year as soon as the current year’s stock is sold out.
Jewelry brands are not the only ones creating such calendars.
Three years ago, Ruby Beales, the buying manager of jewelry and sunglasses at the London department store Liberty, was thinking about its sold-out beauty Advent calendar and wondering if there was an affordable way to do something similar with jewelry. The first “12 Days of Jewelry,” with a multibrand selection of pieces, debuted in 2022.
This year, two versions were released in October; one has sold out. Still on sale is a cabinet-style box, accented with a Liberty peacock print, with 12 numbered drawers that contain pieces from brands such as Tilly Sveaas and Rachel Jackson, which also are sold in the Liberty jewelry hall.
A key element of its popularity, Ms. Beales said, is the fact that the selection costs less than buying them all individually. (The contents of the calendar that still is available is valued at £1,236, or almost twice its £695 sale price.)
And while some shoppers might consider certain countdown calendars to be a bit old fashioned rather than a gift for a college roommate, others are definitely not.
Pura Vida, an affordable jewelry brand in California that targets Gen Z, introduced its first Advent calendar in 2021 and now has two styles: 12 days at $98 and a 24-day design at $148, both in vibrant, somewhat beachy color palettes rather than the usual holiday red and green.
Sheva Lee Absher, the brand’s head of design, said the calendars include core pieces, such as string bracelets, but “we also design styles that are just exclusive to the box — that’s the only time you’ll see them.” This year, pieces include a seascape charm bracelet, ombre hoop rainbow earrings and a cowrie shell pendant necklace.
Exclusivity also is the selling point of Lark & Berry’s jewelry Advent calendar, but at a much different price point: Its three available versions are £7,995 to £89,995 or, in the United States, $10,517 to $118,383 (the fourth, at £3,995, already is sold out).
“Make the Right Call,” as the calendar is titled, has the shape of a black-and-gold British telephone booth, and the 12 drawers inside are filled with items custom-chosen to match the customer’s budget and the recipient’s tastes.
Laura Chavez, the founder of Lark & Berry, a lab-grown diamond brand, said customers had been asking about a calendar so, at the suggestion of her public relations manager in 2020, she experimented with a 24-day earring collection for those with pierced ears.
“I think people start seeing them as a luxury thing,” she said, referring to the calendar’s contents. “Not just, you know, like a chocolate everyday type of thing.”
Simon Battah, a 39-year-old resident of Houston who works in finance, happened across Lark & Berry last year and worked with its staff members to select pieces such as a necklace with three stars and a pair of heart-shape earrings for his mother. “I was looking for something different,” he said, “every year we kind of do the same.”
“I liked the idea that it wasn’t a single piece,” he said, “but a variety of several pieces in one single gift.” And his mother, he said, really enjoyed opening the boxes and then calling him to talk about the contents.
Beyond the jewelry contents, packaging is an important component of Advent calendars, usually designed with some future use in mind.
“We show on our socials how you use it afterwards so it becomes a jewelry box in your room,” Ms. Hordern of Missoma said. “We always want it to be something that you can reuse. This is not something we want you to throw away”
Overall, “I think it is nostalgia,” she said. “And jewelry has always been the most personal of gifts.”
The post Counting Down to the Holidays With Jewelry appeared first on New York Times.
