The Clip On Earrings Guide was started by Misae Richwoods, founder of Minxy’s Jewellery. I first had my ear pierced when I was 15. Apart from being a very painful experience at the time, the unpleasantness of crusty effluent from the injured lobe soon followed. I persevered, cleaning my ear twice daily and twisting my stud in the hope I could soon take it out and wear something more stylish.

That happy day followed a couple of weeks later, yet much to my horror I found once I took my stud out, I couldn’t get anything back in, despite making my ear really sore by the repeated jabbing. Soon after the ear got badly infected. I decided to leave the whole thing. To this day, I have a lump in my earlobe where those piercings were.

Years would go by and I found myself a jeweller. To this day I am shocked by how many reasons there are that women come to use clip on earrings. Here are the most common reasons women tell me they’re wearing clip on earrings:

• Ear lobe was torn after wearing pierced earrings (most commonly by a young child yanking them)
• Ears become allergic to pierced earrings
• The person has developed Keloid Scars
• The person doesn’t feel the need to undergo the painful piercing process (very common with Far Eastern women)
• Occupation means they won’t be able to wear pierced earrings often enough
• Work in fashion, theatre or telly requires rapid change of costume and is therefore better suited to clip on earrings
• Especially large earrings, such as big bling chandeliers, will damage the ear by making the lobe longer
• Fear of catching Hepatitis C from unsterile equipment in salons
• Buying cheap jewellery either whilst on holiday or from overseas sources via the internet gives them skin complaints (EU law has stricter standards on jewellery quality than North America. Other places don’t have any standards).
• A bad ear infection puts them off

At the same time I found that most women didn’t know that much about clip on earrings. I was constantly getting asked the same questions, over and over, to problems that are quite easy to solve. Things like “these earrings are too tight to wear for long – how can I make it more comfortable?”. Eventually I got completely and utterly bored of repeating myself so I thought I’d just write up the answers and stick them on this website so when anyone asks I can just send them here!

If there are questions you want answered, please do let me know as I’m sure there’ll be others who want to know the answer too!