Photo Locket or Projection Necklace: Two Ways to Wear a Photo, Compared
There are two honest ways to carry a photograph around your neck, and they are not competing versions of the same thing. A photo locket is a small hinged case: you open the cover and a printed picture is inside. A projection necklace holds the same picture sealed inside a clear domed stone, invisible in normal light — you hold it toward a window, a lamp, or a phone flashlight and look through it, and the image appears.
On this store both formats sit side by side: photo locket necklaces run to 31 designs, from CA$79.95, and projection photo necklaces run to 52 designs, from CA$69.95, with both ranges topping out at CA$159.95. Because we sell both, we have no reason to talk one of them up. What follows is the comparison we would give a friend, including the parts each format is worse at.
The Short Answer
Choose the locket if the wearer will want to look at the photo often, in any light, and might want a different picture in it one day. Choose projection if the photo should stay private, if the pendant will be worn every day under clothing, or if the picture is one that will never need to change — a grandparent who has died, a wedding day, a pet.
Almost every other difference below follows from that one sentence. If you already know which side you are on, skip to the metals section, because that is where the money and the disappointment usually live.
How a Photo Locket Works
A locket is a container. Two shells are joined by a hinge, held shut by a catch, and the inside is hollow so a picture can sit behind a cover. The picture is a real print — printed on thin photo stock, cut to the shape of that design's opening, and fitted under the cover.
That is the format families have handed down for generations, and it is why a locket reads as an heirloom rather than a gadget. It also means there is nothing to learn: you flick the catch with a thumbnail and the photo is there, in a dark restaurant or a hospital waiting room, with no light source and no technique involved.
Designs here come in heart, oval, and tree-of-life shapes, and a number of them hold two pictures rather than one — a portrait on one side, the two of you together on the other. Selected designs add a birth month stone to the case — if you are pairing a photo with a stone, it is worth knowing what birthstones are actually made of first — and most take engraving on the back.
How a Projection Necklace Works
A projection pendant works by optics, not by opening. Your photograph is reproduced at microscopic scale and sealed inside a clear domed stone during manufacture. Looked at straight on, in ordinary room light, the stone reads as a plain faceted jewel — nobody can tell there is an image in it.
To see the picture you put light behind it. Hold the stone close to one eye and face a window or a lamp and the photo resolves, sharp and full-color, inside the dome. A phone flashlight held behind the stone does the same job at night, and pointing a phone camera at the flat face and zooming in puts the image on screen where you can show it to someone else.
There is no battery, no app, and no electronics to fail, which is the quiet argument for this format: the effect is purely physical, so it works the same in twenty years as on the first day. The trade is that the image is set when the piece is made and cannot be taken out afterward.
Side by Side: Where They Really Differ
The table below includes the weak points of both, because that is the part most comparisons leave out.
| Photo locket | Projection necklace | |
|---|---|---|
| How you see the photo | Open the cover — it is simply there | Hold the stone toward light and look through it |
| In a dim room or a car at night | Works with whatever light there is | Weak point: needs a light source, or there is nothing to see |
| Who else knows the photo is there | Visible to anyone in the room once it is open | Nobody, until the wearer chooses to show it |
| Changing the picture later | Yes — the cover opens, so the print can be lifted out | Weak point: no — sealed in the stone as the piece is made |
| Moving parts | Weak point: a hinge and a catch, which loosen with years of daily opening | None — a solid pendant and a stone |
| Steam, showers, pool water | Weak point: a paper print under a cover dislikes damp and heat | The image sits sealed behind glass, so damp does not reach it |
| Scratches after years of wear | Marks on the flat case can often be polished back | Weak point: a deep scratch across the dome is read through, and cannot be polished out |
| How it lies against the chest | Weak point: thicker at the same width, because the case is hollow | Flatter and lighter for its width |
| Range and starting price | 31 designs, from CA$79.95 | 52 designs, from CA$69.95 |
What Each Format Asks You to Give Up
The locket asks you to accept moving parts and paper. A hinge and a catch are the only mechanical things on the piece, and mechanical things are what eventually give. A catch opened several times a day for years sits looser than it did new — still fine, but no longer crisp. And what is inside is a print behind a cover, not glass-sealed: hot showers, saunas, and chlorinated water are what ruin locket photos, not time. The hollow case also has to be deep enough to hold something, so a locket stands off the skin more than a flat pendant of the same width. Anyone who wears jewelry to sleep tends to notice that.
Projection asks you to accept light and permanence. In a dim room there is genuinely nothing to see, and a first-time wearer has to be shown the trick — hold it up, look through it, not at it. Someone who wants to glance down and see a face will find this format irritating, and that is worth knowing before it is unwrapped. The image also lives entirely in one small dome. A scuff on the flat metal of a locket is cosmetic; a deep scratch across a projection stone sits in the exact path you look through. And the file you upload is the file that stays there — no swapping a growing child's photo in three years.
Who Puts the Photo In, and Why That Settles More Than the Metal
This is the part most shoppers only discover after the parcel arrives. Empty lockets sold in department stores and on marketplaces arrive with a paper insert and leave the fiddly work to you: find a photo, size it, trim it with nail scissors, hope it seats flat under the cover. It is the single most common disappointment with lockets bought as gifts, and it is why some buyers give up and never put a picture in at all.
We fit the photograph before the piece ships, in both formats. You upload the image on the product page and drag it into position, so you see right away how the crop sits inside the pendant's opening — zoom, rotate, and move the face to where you want it, and the position you set on screen is the crop we work from.
Every photo we receive is checked by a person before production. If a file is too small, too dark, or cropped so tightly that the face would be cut off by the opening, we email you and ask for a different one instead of printing it anyway. For a locket we then print at the size of that design's opening, fit the print under the cover, and close the case; designs that hold two are fitted with both. For a projection pendant the image is set into the stone during manufacture. Either way it reaches you finished — nothing to trim, seat, or assemble.
Engraving is a separate field on the product page and is cut exactly as you type it, spaces, capitals, and accents included. The lettering is not rendered on screen for you, so read your line back before adding the piece to the cart.
Metals: Read the Product Page, Not the Photograph
Here is the honest version, and it applies to both ranges. Designs are available in 925 sterling silver as well as stainless steel and other metals, including copper- and brass-based pieces, some finished in a gold or rose tone over the base metal. Sterling silver is an option in both collections — it is not what the whole category is. The exact material for each design is listed on its product page.
Read that line rather than judging from the picture, because on screen a silver-tone finish and solid sterling silver look almost identical. Three phrases in any listing anywhere — silver-tone, silver color, silver-plated — describe a surface, not the metal underneath. If a specific metal matters to you, or the wearer reacts to nickel, that one line on the product page is the only thing worth trusting.
The metals also behave differently rather than ranking against each other. Stainless steel is the least demanding and holds its color with almost no upkeep. Sterling silver is softer and warmer in tone, darkens slowly in air, and comes back with a polishing cloth. A gold or rose tone sits on the surface and thins first where the pendant rubs against clothing. For a piece meant to be worn daily for years, steel is the pragmatic pick and silver the sentimental one — and neither choice changes how the photo works.
Five Real Situations, and What We Would Pick
A memorial for someone who has died. Projection, usually. The photo never needs to change, and the pendant looks like ordinary jewelry, so grief is not on display to every stranger and colleague. The wearer decides when to look.
A gift for a mom or grandmother. Locket. The format is familiar, needs no explanation, opens to a face on the first try, and the two-photo designs let one pendant carry two grandchildren.
A growing child's photo. Locket, clearly. A baby picture you love this year is one you will want to replace, and only the format that opens allows that.
Worn every day, under a work shirt, never taken off. Projection. No catch to loosen, no paper to worry about in the shower, and it lies flatter under a collar.
You genuinely cannot decide. Then decide on the wearer instead of the object: someone who fidgets with their jewelry and shows people things will use a locket; someone private who keeps things to themselves will prefer projection. If the photo is going on a wrist rather than a neck, bracelets with a picture inside use the same two ideas, and the whole range across pendants, bracelets, and rings sits in photo jewelry.
Cost, Delivery, Returns — and Who You Are Buying From
Prices overlap almost completely: CA$79.95 to CA$159.95 for lockets, CA$69.95 to CA$159.95 for projection pendants. Within either range the price is driven by the metal, the size of the pendant, and whether stones are set — not by which format you pick. So budget is rarely the deciding factor here, which is why we put it near the end.
Standard shipping is CA$9.95 and free on orders over CA$139. Delivery runs 7–12 business days once the parcel leaves the studio, tracked the whole way, and the tracking number is emailed to you the day it goes out; several items ordered together are combined into one parcel. As the buyer you are responsible for any customs duties, taxes, or import charges that arise during shipment — we do not add them at checkout and we cannot quote them for you, so treat that as a real line in your budget rather than a surprise. Full rates and timings are on the delivery and shipping page, and the Canadian side of ordering is covered in more detail in our guide to buying personalized jewelry in Canada.
Returns and exchanges run to 60 days from the date you receive your order. Because your jewelry is custom-crafted to be as unique as you are, all sales are final on personalized pieces — a pendant carrying your photograph cannot go back on a shelf. What that does not cover is our own error: if the item is wrong, arrives damaged, or the engraving does not match what you ordered, we replace it or refund it in full, with no postage fees, restocking fees, or hidden charges. The wording is on the return and exchange page.
IfShe has been making personalized jewelry since 2013. The company behind this store is Ifshe Jewelry Co., Limited, registered in Hong Kong, and we run sister storefronts for other markets — ifshe.com for the United States and ifshe.co.uk for the United Kingdom — so a Canadian order is priced in Canadian dollars, shipped from our own studio, and supported by the same team that made it. If you want a human answer before ordering, the contact page reaches us directly.
Questions People Ask Before Ordering
Which one is better quality?
Neither format is inherently better made; quality tracks the individual design and its metal, which is stated on the product page. What differs is the failure mode: a locket can develop a loose catch, and a projection stone can be scratched. Judge the specific piece, not the category.
Can I change the photo later?
In a locket, yes — the cover opens, so the print can be lifted out and another fitted. In a projection pendant, no: the image is sealed inside the stone during manufacture, so pick a picture you will still want in ten years.
Does a projection necklace need an app or a battery?
No. It is optics only. Any light behind the stone works — a window, a lamp, or a phone flashlight — and there is nothing to charge or update.
Do I have to put the photo in myself?
No. We fit it before the piece ships, in both formats, and a person checks your file first. It arrives finished and ready to give.
What kind of photo should I upload?
A sharp, well-lit picture with one or two faces filling the frame. Upload the original file rather than a screenshot or an image forwarded through several apps, since each step throws away detail. Contrast helps more than resolution, and both formats crop tight, so leave the face near the middle.
Which sells more, and does that tell me anything?
Projection is the larger range here — 52 designs against 31 — mostly because there are more stone shapes and settings to build variations on. It is not a verdict on which one the person you are buying for will love.