Pearls against bare necklines, yellow gold, and diamonds with a past set the tone for awards season.
Pearls, yellow gold and spectacular diamonds stand out on the red carpet
The first read of the season
The 78th Primetime Emmy Awards took place on September 14 at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles. The Emmys are traditionally the first major red carpet of awards season, so the jewelry worn there tends to be read as an early signal of what's to come.
Not everyone found the signal new. INSTORE's Beth Bernstein wrote that the trends on display hadn't changed much from last year. Many of the individual pieces were familiar types: chokers, chandelier earrings, antique diamonds and colored stones. The more interesting story is in how specific pieces were worn.
Three materials stood out across the coverage of the night: pearls, yellow gold and diamonds.
Pearls with a plunging neckline
Zendaya wore Mikimoto. Her earrings, from the Les Pétales Place Vendôme collection, featured white South Sea cultured pearls surrounded by 4.40 carats of diamonds. She also wore two rings from the same collection and a diamond and Akoya cultured pearl bracelet with a floral motif. Her dress was a crystal-and-tulle Prada gown with a plunging neckline.
Her stylist, Law Roach, said the aim was to take pearls as timeless as Mikimoto's and make them feel fresh, modern and young. Instead of a single strand at the neck, the pearls were spread across her ears, fingers and wrist, and set against a bare, plunging neckline.
Gold and yellow diamonds
Ryan Michelle Bathe wore a yellow strapless gown by Lia Stublla with Martin Katz jewelry. Her drop earrings were set with canary-yellow pear-shaped diamonds, held in a frame of white diamond pavé with yellow diamond connectors. She also wore a white diamond bib necklace and a three-stone ring combining fancy yellow and white diamonds.
Selena Gomez wore a golden chainmail-style Louis Vuitton dress with Tiffany & Co. jewelry. Her Bird on a Rock Feathers earrings and matching bracelet are both set in platinum with 18-karat yellow gold. She added Jean Schlumberger Stitches and Vigne rings and a Sixteen Stone ring in yellow gold and platinum.
Claire Danes wore Martin Katz's 18-karat gold Stiletto diamond earrings. Meg Stalter arrived painted gold from head to toe as the Emmy statuette itself, gold jewelry included.
Diamonds with a past
Several of the most talked-about diamonds of the night were antique.
Emmy Rossum wore a pair of 19th-century old mine-cut diamond pendant earrings in silver on gold and a 19th-century diamond navette ring, both from Fred Leighton. Amanda Peet also wore Fred Leighton: an antique old mine-cut diamond necklace in silver-topped gold, with old mine-cut drop earrings. Old mine cuts predate the modern round brilliant and were cut by hand, so their proportions vary from stone to stone.
Boucheron's Histoire de Style Art Déco high jewelry collection appeared twice. Grace Gummer wore the Ruban Diamants piece, a transformable design worn as a choker, in white gold paved with diamonds. Olivia Munn wore the Lavallière Diamants necklace, set with diamonds on white gold with black lacquer.
Carrie Coon paired a black Maison Margiela dress with De Beers London diamonds and three cocktail rings. The standout was De Beers London's Talisman ring, a bombé design in white gold set with irregularly shaped blue-green rough diamonds.
Read together, these choices favored diamonds with history and character over the flawless modern stone.
One statement at a time
National Jeweler observed that many looks treated jewelry as an either/or proposition, pairing a statement earring or a statement necklace but not both. Selena Gomez wore earrings and no necklace. Meg Stalter wore a necklace and no earrings.
Lisa Rinna's look was built around a Jacob & Co. high jewelry necklace centered on a 42.73-carat octagonal blue sapphire. She kept everything else simple: diamond studs, a simple ring on one hand and a large cocktail ring on the other.
Sarah Snook wore a Cartier high jewelry diamond mesh bib necklace with matching bracelets on each wrist. Florence Pugh, Bulgari's U.S. brand ambassador, wore a lilac custom Vivienne Westwood gown with a Bulgari high jewelry necklace in 18-karat pink gold, set with diamonds, pear-shaped morganites and pear-shaped green tourmalines.
Jewelry that changes shape
Two pieces on the carpet were designed to be worn in more than one way. Sarah Pidgeon wore Chanel's Diamant Evanescent lariat with a lilac Chanel slip gown. The lariat's camellia-shaped centerpiece can be repositioned along its diamond chain to form a sautoir, or removed and worn as a brooch. Grace Gummer's Boucheron Ruban Diamants piece is also transformable and was worn in its choker form.
More adventurous choices from the men
Galerie Magazine noted increasingly adventurous jewelry on the men. Colman Domingo, a Boucheron Friend of the Maison who won the Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for Euphoria, wore five pieces by the house. The centerpiece was the Green Garden brooch from Boucheron's Histoire de Style, Like A Queen high jewelry collection, paved with green tourmalines and diamonds and finished with green lacquer in white gold. He wore it on the sash at his waist rather than on his lapel. In an interview, Domingo credited the brooch's inspiration to a piece Boucheron made for Princess Elizabeth to receive on her 18th birthday in 1944.
He was not the only man wearing a brooch. Hacks star Paul W. Downs wore a vintage David Webb brooch in carved turquoise, gold and diamonds as a boutonnière. Mark Ronson wore an all-black Celine look with Audemars Piguet's new-for-2026 Royal Oak Self-Winding watch, whose malachite dial makes each piece one of a kind.
Beyond the big houses
Allison Janney wore pink jewelry by the Indian designer Sabyasachi with a feathered Pamella Roland gown. Supriya Ganesh wore an Irene Neuwirth necklace: a 16-inch strand in 18-karat gold combining round, oval, marquise and emerald-cut aquamarines, matched to her McQueen gown.
The Emmys rarely introduce an entirely new idea. This year's carpet was a showcase for pearls worn against modern silhouettes, gold and yellow diamonds, antique and rough-cut stones, and single statement pieces. Paris Fashion Week is now underway, and the next question is whether the runway is moving in the same direction.
Related reading: The return of pearls, but not the way you expect and What jewelry looks like off the runway.
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