You might remember how Balenciaga’s Autumn 2007 sandals were re-christened by many as the “Lego shoes” for their colours that called to mind the famous children’s blocks. Since then it’s not only Lego colours, but also the actual blocks that have turned fashionable.
Exactly one year ago, to present her Spring 2008 collection, Korean-American designer Joy Han sent out on the catwalk models wearing giant Lego hair accessories. 
The Lego trend came back on the catwalk during Jean-Charles de Castelbajac’s show at the recent Paris Fashion Week.
The French designer seemed to have used Lego blocks as the base colour for his rainbow dresses, but also as the main inspiration for prints on dresses, blouses, skirts, men’s suits and rucksacks/bags. 
Real Lego blocks were instead used to create amazingly bizarre shades or headdresses in the shape of houses and hats.
Lego has a definitive optimistic and therefore therapeutic quality about it: it’s colourful and fun and you can create with it anything that you fancy, so it’s only natural and, in some ways also inevitable, that many designers looking for inspirations have turned to it for inspirations.
But while for some designers Lego is just an element that can be used to create small accessories, San Francisco-based Emiko Oye has taken it to a different stage. 
Inspired by hardware, haute couture and salvaged materials, Oye has created her own line of jewellery, Reware that features urban pieces made from new and used Lego, with silver and gold elements, gemstones and recycled materials.
Her collections feature Lego block bracelets in different sizes and shapes (I love the triangular ones as they have a strange Art Deco quality about them) and fanciful colours and necklaces and earrings featuring Lego wheels, zirconia and even mini-figures. Oye also made ironic limited edition pieces of her earrings, featuring famous film couples such as Batman and Catwoman or Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia.
Oye’s best pieces though are the ones she has done for different exhibitions and events. Just a few days ago her new exhibition “My First Royal Jewels” opened at the San Francisco Museum of Craft and Design. For the occasion Oye has reinterpreted precious necklaces from the 20th century by Louis Boucheron, Cartier and Harry Winston, replacing the original diamonds, emeralds, amethysts and rubies with various Lego pieces that perfectly manage to recreate that peculiar precious stone effect.
The artist’s work also implies a certain degree of social research: in the past gemstones passed down from generation to generation, necklaces were sometimes disassembled and reassembled into different pieces of jewellery. Oye does the same as she employs in her work used Lego pieces, sometimes handed down from family and friends, and explores through this exhibition – during which people are invited to try on her reinterpreted pieces – the transformation Lego can go through and the sentimental value it can have for both adults and children.
To know more about the making of Oye’s pieces you can read her blog, but if you’re passing through San Francisco you’d better visit her interactive exhibition at the SF Museum of Craft and Design which is on until January.
If you’re looking instead for affordable Lego jewellery to wear everyday, don’t go further than Hannah Zakari. The site offers a wide selection of items by Legomaniac Swank (AKA Becky Wignell), one of the founder members of the Leeds Craft Mafia. Swank’s collection includes fun pieces such as mini-figure necklaces and geometrical laser cut Lego base necklaces and earrings.
A final honourable Lego mention goes to Treviso-based Claudia Zalla who produces funny bow tie and smile-y face necklaces and brooches and brick earrings under the name I Love Bla.
Want to match Swank or I Love Bla’s accessories with some Lego inspired clothes? Check out Ruffeo Hearts Lil Snotty’s Etsy page. The brand offers various garments in coloured geometric patterns. All the items are made using recycled materials which also perfectly ties in with the transformation theme intrinsic to Lego.
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