a trend i can actually wear: leather wrap bracelets

alright! so i guess i survived my first blog entry and now we're on to number two. things are looking good.

today's story begins a few months ago, when my sister and i took a trip to italy. throughout our vacation (we were in rome, capri and florence) i saw leather bracelets everywhere. i actually quite liked them, but by the time we got to florence where i was thinking of getting one (you know, being a city of leather and all that) i had spent way too much money and decided it was unnecessary. that was a really dumb decision and i knew even as i made it that i would regret it later - oh well.

so you can imagine how excited / dismayed i was to see that leather wrap bracelets are popping up in relatively mainstream retail locations this fall. excited because i can get my hands on one, dismayed because probably every single girl at my school will have one that is exactly like mine when i could have had a unique one from italy. le sigh. anyway, the first one that caught my eye is the gorjana graham leather studded wrap in gold:

they are available in pretty much every colour ever, but i love the "grey" one, which to me looks more like brown, but whatever. i love the little studs - i think i could actually pull them off even though my wardrobe is 95% cardigans aka prep city. i also like that the studs are gold - you can get them in silver, but 95% of my jewelry wardrobe is silver so i like to branch out sometimes. this bracelet is $55USD and i am really hoping i can snag one at neiman marcus while i'm in san francisco, because apparently neiman carries gorjana. i'll keep you posted.

the second version i like, and which i actually saw a couple of weekends ago in florida but didn't buy and now regret that decision (hmm...) is the flat stud double-wrap bracelet from j. crew:

this one is available in tuscan olive (pictured) and black. i like tuscan olive - the black seems too extreme with the gold studs, and as discussed above that probably wouldn't go well with my preppy wardrobe. it's also nice that the length is adjustable. the j. crew in san francisco (where i am right now) didn't have this bracelet, but it did have another wrap leather bracelet sans studs with a belt-like closure. apparently i do learn from my mistakes sometimes, because i got that one - it's kind of dark brown / mauve-y and sparkly, and therefore awesome. i can't seem to find it online though, so you i guess you'll just have to imagine it. :) i can't remember how much mine was, but the one above is $26.50USD and i know mine wasn't much more than that. personally that seems like a pretty reasonable price for a piece of jewelry that is pretty much costume, but that will last a while because it's leather. 

a final thought about this leather wrap bracelet situation. i generally shy away from costume jewelry because my skin is super sensitive, especially on my hands, and metals other than silver and gold leave a lovely (hideous) greenish brownish tinge on my skin. but since leather is not a metal (i know, shocking) it shouldn't leave a mark. even if you're worried about the metal clasps, they can be arranged so they're on top of the other "layer" of leather and don't touch your skin. it's not very often that i find "costume" / cheaper jewelry which i actually like, so i am pretty excited!