oubtless, one of the most exciting trends in ear climbers this season is how they’ve stepped up in size. Big time. I mean, really, really big.

Just before summer of 2014, I blogged here in an article entitled “No Ear Climbers? Bad Non-Move.” As anticipated, a good number of readers responded to that blog, telling me they thought climbers were ugly—some saying they looked like caterpillars. Well, as time has shown us over this past year-and-a-half–despite the larvae references–many more ear climbers have crawled onto the scene. Like it or not, it’s a real subcategory of earrings.

But now, in these last few months, actual climber pieces seem to have gotten gargantuan. As a creative community often does when given a new concept—aka “a challenge”–designers have run with it. The newest entries typically slither way higher up the ear than the first ones we saw–often to the helix. And now, too, many are wider at the center than jewelry’s initial offerings, extending beyond the ear’s profile. I especially like the latest styles that dribble below the lobe with gems, clusters of stones, and mini motifs like stars and zodiac symbols. More than a few dangles are detachable, so, as a plus, they offer much-needed versatility in what I hope becomes a jewelry wardrobe staple.

Do some still have that caterpillar-like silhouette? Well, with the freshest colossal climbers of graduated-size gems, which go from small to large (or vice versa) up the ear, that’s one way to look at the outline. Still, the reality is that new über-sized climbers are über hot.

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