This collection will release on 10/30/2026

The Anarchy universe is expanding to the Victorian Era, because Victorians were pretty metal. 

My fascination with the Victorian age began with my love of gothic literature (though equally possible that it began with watching Masterpiece Theatre with my grandma as a child). Through literature, the Brontë sisters beckoned me across windswept moors while Dracula, Dorian Gray, and Poe chilled the foggy, cobblestone streets of my imagination. Gothic novels spirited me away to a world of shadows, specters, and secrets behind locked doors. There is an irresistible allure to this world of mystery and melancholy—and a dark romance that is undeniable.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF VICTORIAN JEWELRY

The Victorian Era was really long (1837-1901), and it wasn’t all dark and morbid. 

The 19th century was a time of great social change, and these changes reached all facets of society, including fashion. Within the country, the Industrial Revolution began upending the strict hierarchical structure of society and advances in manufacturing along with discoveries of gemstone and fine metal deposits made jewelry available to the masses. 

The mass production of jewelry meant that it was no longer solely for the aristocracy. The rapidly growing middle class could now express themselves through jewelry, and these sentimental Victorians had a lot to express. They were also big fans of amulets that could impart some magical protection, luck, or abilities to the wearer. These two qualities mean jewelry of this era full of symbolism and hidden meaning. Common motifs that are still popular today include snakes (Queen Victoria’s engagement ring was a serpent!), padlocks, flowers, hearts, and horseshoes. My favorite Victorian style is acrostic jewelry, which uses a language of gemstones to convey a hidden message.

A few trends that didn’t survive the relentless march of time, however, include jewelry made of dead bugs, small birds, and human hair.

In addition to the changes brought about by industrialization and urbanization, Britain’s colonization of much of the world (boo!) gave Victorians access to a wide array of foreign goods and ideas that widened their perspective and shaped many of the era's trends. For example, archaeological discoveries inspired Egyptian and Etruscan revivals while the minimalism and reverence for nature in Japanese wood block prints contributed to the Aesthetic Movement, in direct contrast to industrialism.

As Victorian fashion goes, it's worth noting that there's no such thing as one, singular "Victorian aesthetic." Queen Victoria's reign lasted over 60 years, so to attribute one style to this whole era would be like future historians defining the fashion trends between the 1960s to today by how people dressed in 1979. Fashion changed dramatically during the Victorian era: big bustle, no bustle, bright color, no color, puffy sleeves, narrow sleeves, bell-shaped sleeves, petticoats, crinolines, over-the-top dresses, subdued, minimalist dresses, exaggerated body proportions, natural silhouettes, and on and on.  

QUEEN VICTORIA, THE FIRST INFLUENCER

The British are obsessed with their royals, and the Victorians were no exception. Queen Victoria single-handedly influenced an adoring public’s fashion tastes. She was young, vibrant, and deeply in love with her husband, Prince Albert--and this joy radiated in her fashion choices. Victoria and Albert represented a new age of possibility for a public enamored with their young royal couple. Basically, what Victoria wore, everyone else wanted. And thanks to advancements in manufacturing, they could now afford to dress like their icon. 

An example of her lasting influence: White wedding dresses? Queen Victoria started that.

She was also a MASSIVE lover of jewelry and her husband, Prince Albert, gifted her many iconic pieces over the course of their marriage.  What I love about Queen Victoria's jewelry collection is that it's deeply sentimental. Many of her most cherished pieces represented her love for her family, including a charm bracelet featuring locks of hair from each of her children.

MOURNING JEWELRY

Today, the misconception about Victorian fashion is that it was all black, drab, and rigidly conservative, but this would correspond specifically to Queen Victoria’s prolonged mourning period following the death of her husband, Prince Albert. She wore only black for the rest of her life, which lasted another 40 years. Most jewelry was deemed too flashy for a sad person to wear, so all black jewelry made of jet or enamel became popular. This black on black look is definitely pretty metal. Pearls were also deemed "acceptable" during mourning because they were thought to represent tears.

The concept of mourning jewelry began in the middle ages but peaked in popularity during the Victorian Era as Victorians sought to literally wear their grief. As you recall, symbolic jewelry was very important to Victorians and it was the perfect vessel to express their love and loss. Jewelry made of intricately braided human hair, often of the deceased, was incredibly popular and not weird at all. Some of this hair jewelry is simply stunning--like hair woven into fine lace or neatly coiled behind glass in a locket. If you can get over the initial icky feeling, the sentiment is absolutely beautiful.

INSPIRATION FOR VICTORIAN ANARCHY: 

My initial notes for this collection:

• Punk rock meets dark romance. Gothic novels, mourning jewelry, symbolism, snakes, heavy watch chains, braided hair, memento mori, silver, fog, luminous pearls

Adding a Victorian chapter to our punk rock Anarchy story may be a little unexpected, but I think it fits perfectly. This was an age of empire (boo!), but it was also an era of social rebellion, with the rise of the middle class and the first worker’s rights and women’s rights movements--what is more punk rock than raging against the machine?

I wanted these pieces to feel like a natural evolution of the refined yet rebellious Anarchy aesthetic, while adding in specific elements of Victorian fashion. Two designers I love who do an incredible job of mixing past and punk are Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen, and though Yū|Mono's aesthetic differs from both, I hope express my own interpretation of this theme starting with the Victorian Anarchy collection. I hope to add more pieces to this sub-collection in the future!

No AI was used in the writing of this post, which explains the poor grammar and possible missing punctuation. We are not sorry.