This question comes up quite often in regards to ballroom earrings and at the end of the day, it depends mostly on personal comfort.

Generally, we tend to recommend clip-ons for a few reasons:

  • The larger stone cluster earrings are a bit heavier, so having a giant “pad” pushed against your ear distributes the weight more comfortably and also the earring tends to sit flatter and more stable against the earlobe. Aesthetically it looks a bit better.
  • While they can fly off, should your earring get caught up in some costuming, you will want this to happen!
  • To help prevent earring fly-off, you can use adhesive like eyelash glue.
  • We do put ear cushions on the back of the lever, which help with comfort.

Here is an earring example of ours, and you can see the cluster size:

Tzafora ballroom jewelry

This kind of cluster is typical of the type of earring we recommend for a clip-on backing. It won’t “droop” and it tends to look and feel a bit better.

Alternatively, what also works usually well (although we still don’t feel like the larger earrings sit quite as nice) is a french-clip… which offers a bit more support than just a post, but is for pierced ears:

french clips

With a little rubber stop on the back (you usually can just squeeze one on) these tend to stay very, very well. And some people prefer that feeling over a clip.

Generally by default, we tend to put regular clip-ons for most of our cluster-earrings so they are ready-to-ship/wear. However should you see something you like in our earring department but wish to have a specific style of backing, please don’t be shy to contact us.

On some of the very small earrings, we have found posts tend to work (and look) the best.