Emily Blunt’s Pearl-and-Diamond Mikimoto Necklace Steals Met Gala Spotlight

Emily Blunt did not wear jewelry as an accessory at the Met Gala. She wore it as the silhouette. A Mikimoto pearl body necklace, valued at roughly $500,000, ran across her black-and-white red carpet look and became the piece that defined everything around it.

The necklace anchored a custom Ashi Studio outfit built from a black two-piece with an antique-finished tulle corseted bodice, glass-bead embroidery, beaded fringe tassel sleeves and silk straight-leg trousers. Against that sharp tailoring, the jewelry read less like a necklace and more like a second garment, draped over the torso and arms in a way that softened the severity of the black with the sheen of pearls and diamonds. WWD reported that the piece was set in 18-karat white gold and carried a 21.85-carat pear-shaped morganite at the center, plus 45.97 carats of diamonds.

That mix of materials mattered. Thousands of Akoya pearls gave the necklace its volume and movement, while the morganite introduced a pale blush note that kept the jewel from feeling too icy or rigid. The result was high jewelry with a wearable line, the kind of red-carpet engineering that lets a single piece do the work of both ornament and styling device. Blunt said in an official statement that the creation felt like “wearable art,” and Jessica Paster said the team deliberately reversed the usual Met Gala formula so the body necklace became the garment and defined the silhouette.

The choice fit the 2026 Met Gala theme, Costume Art, which drew on the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s spring 2026 Costume Institute exhibition and the relationship between clothing and the human form. Blunt’s look made that idea literal. Instead of treating jewelry as the finishing touch, she let Mikimoto’s pearlwork lead the composition, turning the necklace into the most important line on the body.

Mikimoto’s own history gives the choice another layer. Founded in Japan and credited with the world’s first successful cultured pearl in 1893, the house has long treated pearls as both invention and inheritance. On Blunt, that legacy appeared in a modern register, paired with Bows Akoya Pearl Earrings, a Pearl Ring and a Bows Akoya Ring that kept the emphasis on luminous white surfaces.

Blunt posed with her sister Felicity Blunt and The Devil Wears Prada 2 co-star Stanley Tucci, but the image that lingered was the necklace itself, a pearl-and-diamond structure that made the case for jewelry as the look, not just an addition to it.