Tennis Jewelry Isn't Just Your Mom's Anymore — Korea's 20-Somethings Have Taken It Over

 Hi, unnis and friends —

A few weeks ago I wrote about picking up my first tennis racket. What I didn't expect was that tennis would lead me down a completely different rabbit hole — not swing weights this time, but tennis jewelry.

A Very Different Kind of "Tennis Item"

If the name sounds odd for a piece of jewelry, there's a real story behind it. Back in 1978 (and again memorably in 1987), tennis champion Chris Evert had a diamond line bracelet snap off her wrist mid-match at the US Open. Play stopped while people searched the court for the scattered stones, it made television, and the style has been called a "tennis bracelet" ever since. The matching necklace version picked up the same name, even though it has no actual connection to Evert herself.

Where the legendary name first began in 1978.

For a long time here, this was squarely a piece for an older generation — the kind of classic, delicate diamond line bracelet your mother or grandmother might have owned for decades. Understated, a little formal, not something you'd associate with anyone in their twenties.

That's shifted, fast.

How a 20-Something Idol Flipped the Trend

Tennis bracelets in Korea started skewing younger a while back, but tennis necklaces are having their own moment right now, and Mimi, a member of the girl group Oh My Girl, has certainly helped push the look into younger circles — her tennis necklace look got picked up and recreated across shopping and jewelry communities here. Posts with titles along the lines of "trying to copy Mimi's necklace" or "does anyone know what bracelet Mimi is wearing" have been popping up steadily — the kind of specific, detail-obsessed thread that tells you a trend has properly taken hold, not just passed through.

The Debate Everyone's Having: How Big Is Too Big?

Once you're actually shopping for one, you run into the same argument constantly: carat size. In Korean jewelry shops, buyers often talk about stone size in bu (부) rather than carats directly — 10 bu corresponds to roughly 0.10 carat per stone in the line, so a "10-bu" tennis bracelet is a meaningfully bigger, more noticeable piece than a "3-bu" one.

Close-up of tennis bracelets with different stone sizes

Opinions run in every direction — some people swear a small, barely-there line is the only tasteful option, others think if you're going to wear one, it should actually be seen. My own take, for what it's worth: if you're planning to wear it daily, something in the 2-to-3-bu range wears easily with everything and doesn't feel like "an occasion" every time you put it on. But if you actually want it to register — to have some presence when someone looks at your wrist or neckline — you're probably looking at 5 bu or more. Anything smaller than that tends to just disappear into the rest of your jewelry.

There's also constant chatter about clasp style, link spacing, and how "line-like" versus "chunky" the setting looks — the kind of granular detail that shows up once something moves from "nice piece of jewelry" to full-blown obsession. A few things people specifically watch for: whether the stones are set flush against each other with no protruding prongs (so it won't snag on a sweater — bezel settings are especially good for this), whether the line reads as one continuous, unbroken run of light rather than a series of visibly separate stones, and whether it actually flexes and rotates smoothly around the wrist without kinking or feeling stiff. A well-made clasp disappears into the line entirely rather than sitting like an obvious hinge, and it's common to see people trading names of specific jewelers known for getting all of this right.

Natural, Lab-Grown, or Moissanite?

From bezel settings to classic prong designs.

Part of why this trend has spread so quickly among younger buyers is that the stone itself doesn't have to be a natural diamond anymore. Lab-grown diamonds and moissanite have both become popular, more accessible alternatives, and a lot of the appeal of a tennis bracelet — a continuous line of stones, which naturally costs more the bigger it gets — is a lot less intimidating in either of those materials.

This isn't just a tennis-bracelet phenomenon, either. The broader diamond industry has genuinely been shaken by lab-grown stones over the past few years — reporting on the sector describes lab-grown diamonds now making up a striking share of engagement ring sales, at a fraction of the price of natural ones, to the point that natural diamond prices themselves have come under real pressure. The old assumption that a "real" diamond automatically means a natural one feels a lot less settled than it used to.

My own take: moissanite tends to throw off a slightly different, more rainbow-toned flash than a diamond does, which isn't for everyone. If I'm going to wear a line of stones every day, I'd still want it to be at least lab-grown diamond — the sparkle just feels a notch more special to me than moissanite does.

Versatile enough for everyday wear without feeling formal.

From the Tennis Court to Everyone's Neckline

There's something a little funny about the fact that a genuine tennis injury from the 1970s eventually turned into one of the most quietly persistent jewelry trends in Korea, jumping generations along the way. I doubt Chris Evert had any idea, mid-match, that she was about to name an entire jewelry category — let alone one that would end up trending among 20-somethings in Seoul, sparked by a K-pop idol, half a century later.

Whether you're firmly on team "barely-there line" or team "make it count," I hope you find the exact carat that feels like you.