Triazolam

Triazolam is a hypnotic medication used to treat insomnia, sold under the brand name Halcion. Its structural beauty lies in the benzodiazepine core at its heart, a now-iconic scaffold that was first discovered entirely by accident. Through the latter half of the twentieth century, benzodiazepines became one of the most prescribed drug families in the world. Subsequent research, however, revealed that drugs in this class, triazolam among them, can carry serious adverse effects, and prescription is now banned in some countries and carefully regulated in others.

In these earrings, the molecule is held in silver as a small reminder of pharmaceutical history. A reminder that even our most useful medicines can be double-edged, and that scientific understanding of a molecule continues to evolve long after it first reaches the shelf.