My Notes From the COUTURE Jewelry Show in Vegas, Baby!
How designers are dealing with the high price of gold, trends and other observations made from the most important event on the jewelry calendar
We are living in a timeline that jewelry historians will put a pin in for generations to come. The price of gold per ounce has nearly doubled in the last year. It rose from around $2,600 in January 2025 to a staggering high of $5,400 in January 2026. Over on The Jewelry Wire, Rob Bates reported last week that “gold has replaced the US dollar as central banks’ favorite investment.”
If you want to sell pieces from your jewelry box this is great news. But if you are trying to introduce a new collection of fine jewelry, the price jump is a nightmare. This cloud can’t be given a silver lining either. Every time I say the word “silver” to designers, they whine about how its price has risen too.
In an attempt to look at the issue through a rosy historical lens, the challenges could transform into a period of great creativity for those who can weather, or work around, the turbulence. I am thinking of the 1930s Depression era when necessity became the mother of invention for legends like Belperron, Verdura and Flato.
There were certainly signs of contemporary designers’ imaginations running wild last week at the COUTURE jewelry show held at the Wynn in Las Vegas.
Some dealt with the gold issue in witty ways. (I am not kidding.) Others got creative with personalized pieces featuring messages that read like mottos of strength. And then there were those who added transformable elements. These mechanicals felt extra special and worthy of a larger investment.
Find out all about it, as well as other trends and observations below. Note: Because many of the pieces just debuted at COUTURE and are not yet available, they are not linked to the designers’ websites.
Worth Its Weight In Gold
Most designers just get annoyed when bad things happen to them. Marie Lichtenberg responds with jewelry.
