We Won. Commercial Jewellery Designer of the Year 2026

Lucy Lee, our founder, creative director, and the person behind every piece of jewellery that leaves this studio, has been named Commercial Jewellery Designer of the Year at the UK Jewellery Awards 2026. Not shortlisted. Won.

Two consecutive years on the shortlist, in the same category, judged by the same independent panel of industry experts. This year they handed her the title. We are allowed to say it out loud now, no touching wood.

Here is what the judges said:

"Our judges singled out this designer for their considered product development strategies, keen eye for detail, and savvy commerciality."

We have read it more times than we will admit to.

About the award

The UK Jewellery Awards, now in their 34th year, are organised by Retail Jeweller and are widely regarded as the most credible recognition in British jewellery. Around 600 designers, retailers, brands and suppliers gather for the ceremony each year. The judging is independent, rigorous, and based on real commercial and creative achievement.

Commercial Jewellery Designer of the Year is the category for designers working inside jewellery brands. Design that has to function in the real world: sell well, connect with customers, stand up to production, and still mean something. Design that has to perform commercially.

This year's shortlist included designers from some of the biggest names in UK and international jewellery, among them Sif Jakobs, Kit Heath, ORA Pearls, Claudia Bradby and Lucy Quartermaine. Lucy runs an independent studio with no outside investment, over 350 charms in the Lily Charmed collection, all manufactured ethically in recycled sterling silver, rhodium plated for tarnish resistance, and designed to fit Pandora and other major charm bracelets. She works with CAD specialists and hand wax carvers who turn her sketches into finished pieces. She is the one who walked away with the title.

Design that has to perform commercially.

A Bit About LUCY

Before founding Lily Charmed in 2011, Lucy spent years in television production, including work on Strictly Come Dancing, which, it turns out, is surprisingly good training for jewellery design. Both involve understanding what people are watching for, what makes something feel special, and what an audience actually responds to versus what you think they should respond to.

She launched Lily Charmed because she couldn't find charm jewellery that felt genuinely personal, pieces that told a real story rather than a generic (mass produced) one. Fifteen years later, with over 350 charms in the collection, that remains the brief.

In 2016 she launched Scream Pretty, a sister brand with a completely different design identity, focused on ear styling and bold jewellery. Two brands, two distinct voices, one designer holding the creative thread across both.

She also designs for other jewellery brands, clients she does not name, but whose pieces you have probably come across. Some of Lily Charmed's best-loved collections come from Lucy's collaboration with her sister, the artist Jessica Pearce: the Manifest, Zodiac and Goddess collections. The Goddess Collection alone took months of research into symbolism and mythology, and it shows in the detail of every charm.  

How she actually designs

It starts with listening. Lucy's process is collaborative because it has to be, not because it reads well on a values page. She talks to customers, stockists, friends and colleagues, and listens for the things people wish existed.

A charm gets made when several people, in separate conversations, describe the same feeling or moment or object they would want to carry with them. Does this mean enough to enough people? That filter is what keeps the collection unique, and real.

The result is jewellery made to last decades. Bought once, worn forever, handed down if you are lucky.

Designing two distinct brands at the same time, Lily Charmed's warm, narrative-led charm world and Scream Pretty's bolder, fashion-forward aesthetic, takes a kind of creative code-switching most designers never have to do. Add the confidential commercial client work, and her range as a designer is far broader than any single brand suggests. Which, as it happens, is a fair description of "savvy commerciality".