The Gilded Age: Gladys's Earrings Are Modern, and Still $3,275

$9,175. That is what the three pieces of jewellery a small New York workshop put on Gladys Russell in The Gilded Age cost if you buy them new today, from the workshop's own site, all three at once. Every one of them is in stock. Not one is an antique, a reproduction, or a licensed tie-in — they are current production from a jeweller who makes everything in New York and who has never once mentioned the show anywhere on her own website.

That last part is the strange bit, and it is where this piece started. We read the entire catalogue on 23 August 2026, then went looking for the one jewel in this show that money genuinely cannot buy, and found it sitting in a case in Texas.

Three pieces, and how we know

The identification here does not come from anyone pausing a stream. In December 2023 the jewellery trade title INSTORE published a piece on Hayley Elise Jewellery's appearance in the series, naming the Amaryllis earrings as worn by Gladys Russell in season two, episode one — and stating that the brand itself had told the writer about two further pieces later in the same season.

That is the maker confirming which of her own objects went on camera. In this category it is close to the best evidence there is, and it is why all three are graded as exact identifications rather than sightings.

Those figures come from the shop's own product feed rather than from any article about it, read on 23 August 2026 in the United States market. The distinction matters more than it sounds: shops on this platform can serve a different catalogue and different money depending on where the request comes from, so we asked for the US catalogue explicitly and checked the store's base currency separately. It prices natively in US dollars. These are the numbers an American reader is shown at checkout, not a conversion we did ourselves.

The materials descriptions above are the workshop's own wording, condensed. Each piece is listed individually with its stone count, dimensions and finish, which is not something you can say about most jewellery that turns up in a period drama.

Nothing has moved in almost three years

The 2023 article listed those pieces at $3,275, $2,800 and $3,100. Today they are $3,275, $2,800 and $3,100.

Screen association normally does something to a price. Sometimes it removes the object from sale entirely; sometimes it becomes the whole value, as it did when 161 lots of costumes, furniture and vehicles went through Bonhams and a reproduction carriage from The Crown made more than four times what the show's most photographed dress did. Here it has done nothing whatsoever, and the reason appears to be that the workshop is not trading on it.

We searched every product page, every tag and the homepage. The show is not named once. There is no "as seen on" badge, no capsule collection, no landing page. The catalogue holds 34 pieces; 30 are available and 4 are sold out, which is roughly what you would expect of a studio jeweller and nothing like what you would expect of a brand with a television credit to sell.

The one jewel here that is genuinely of the period is in Texas

The show's most imposing piece of jewellery goes the other way entirely. According to the Natural Diamond Council's account of the series' jewels, the tiara Bertha Russell wears to the opening of the Metropolitan Opera House at the close of season two is a recreation of a real object: the Fabergé tiara made for Empress Josephine's briolette diamonds, produced around 1890 by the workmaster August Holmström.

The original is not for sale and has not been for a long time. Fabergé's own newsroom records the moment it went public, describing the McFerrin Collection's first display at the Houston Museum of Natural Science as "more than 350 spectacular objects, including the breathtaking Diamond Tiara of the Empress Josephine". The Natural Diamond Council reports that it last changed hands at Christie's in 2007. We are not quoting a hammer price for that sale, because we could not reach the auction house's own record of it, and a figure we cannot check at source is not a figure we will print.

What we can price is the door. The museum's Fabergé gallery is a permanent exhibit drawn from the same collection, and it is covered by general admission — no separate ticket. From the museum's own hours and admission page, read the same day: $25 for adults aged 12 and over, $16 for children aged 3 to 11, $16 for seniors aged 62 and over and for military with ID, free for infants aged 2 and under. Permanent exhibits are free on Tuesday evenings from 5pm to 8pm, first come first served.

One honest warning before anyone books a flight. The museum's exhibit page does not itemise the Empress Josephine tiara; the tiara it currently puts forward as a highlight is a different one, in aquamarine. A collection of that size rotates its cases, and the Fabergé display is one room inside a much larger museum. If that specific tiara is the reason for the trip, ask the museum before you travel rather than after you land. This is the same arithmetic we ran on Highclere Castle's ticket releases — standing in the room is usually the affordable version of wanting the object, but only if the object is actually in the room that week.

The argument the jewellery trade has been having since episode three

None of this is settled taste. In February 2022, three episodes into the first season, the jewellery writer Beth Bernstein used the same trade title to ask whether the show's jewellery should have stayed in its own decade, noting that antique dealers were already asking on Instagram why period pieces were not being used.

Her comparison is the useful part. She points out that Julian Fellowes' earlier productions largely stayed with the era — Gosford Park's Chanel Joaillerie and Tessier pieces, and Downton Abbey's borrowed antique tiaras and the Swarovski recreations Andrew Prince built from paintings of the period. We have priced the modern end of that ourselves: the thirteen antique pieces lent to the Downton finale came from a single Piccadilly dealer, and five of them are still listed at between £55,000 and £185,000.

Set those two shows side by side and the taste argument turns into a shopping one. Downton's answer to "can I have that" is £185,000 and a phone call to Piccadilly. The Gilded Age's answer, for at least three objects, is a checkout button and $3,275.

There is a third route, which is to build the collaboration after the fact and license it, the way Bridgerton did with Pandora, and a fourth, which is to put the actual jeweller in the scene — Sirens filmed Fred Leighton's creative director playing herself, choosing real stock. What The Gilded Age does is quieter than any of them and, for a reader, better: it dresses a character in things that were simply for sale, and then never mentions it.

What we could not pin down

Two things, and we would rather say so than fill the gaps.

Temple St. Clair. The brand is named as a supplier for Bertha Russell by both trade pieces above, four years apart, and the second attributes the choice of moonstone to the designer's reading of the character. No specific piece has been identified anywhere we could find. We pulled the brand's entire US catalogue — 438 products, 78 of them involving moonstone, the cheapest of those $1,350 and the most expensive object in the shop $195,000 — and we are not going to point at one and call it screen-worn on the strength of a stone.

Peggy's engagement ring. Described in the season three finale coverage as pearls and diamonds in a yellow-gold floral cluster, with several writers noting it reads mid-century rather than Victorian. No maker is named by anyone, including the production.

The way in is $600, and it is not the earrings

The three screen pieces are four-figure objects, and most people reading this are not going to buy them. The workshop's own catalogue has a bottom rung, though, and it is unusually low for the same hand and the same finish.

The cheapest pieces are the single studs, sold one at a time rather than in pairs: the Single Petal Stud and the Single Violetta Stud at $600 each, the Single Aria Stud and Single Mini Orchid Stud at $695, and the Mini Orchid Pendant at $890. Five of the 34 pieces sit under $1,000. They carry the same matte, granulated gold surface as the earrings that went on camera, which is the actual reason a 2020s design can sit on an 1882 character without jarring — the period read comes from the texture of the metal and the old-fashioned marquise cuts, not from the stones being antique.

One caution about the Cuore pieces specifically. They are one-of-a-kind by design, each built around a hand-picked opal, and the catalogue shows what that means in practice: three Dark Opal Cuore Pendants are listed at $2,115 and all three are sold out, as is the $1,380 Alim Pendant. The Wand pendant being in stock today is not a standing condition. When one of those sells, there is no restock — there is another stone and a different necklace.

FAQ

What jewellery does Gladys Russell wear in The Gilded Age? Among other pieces, three by the New York maker Hayley Elise Jewellery: the Amaryllis earrings in season two episode one, and the Venus Drop earrings and Dark Opal Cuore Wand pendant later in the same season. The brand confirmed the latter two to INSTORE magazine in December 2023.

Can I actually buy the earrings from The Gilded Age? Yes. The Amaryllis earrings are $3,275 and in stock on the maker's own site as of 23 August 2026, alongside the Venus Drop earrings at $2,800 and the Wand pendant at $3,100. All three prices are unchanged since 2023.

Is the jewellery in The Gilded Age historically accurate? Partly, and deliberately not. The show mixes Belle Époque and Edwardian pieces with Art Deco finds and current production. Jewellery journalists have been objecting to that since the first season, which is a fair criticism of the period-drama craft and also the only reason any of it is purchasable.

What is Bertha Russell's Fabergé tiara? A recreation of the tiara made around 1890 by the Fabergé workmaster August Holmström to hold Empress Josephine's briolette diamonds, worn in the season two finale at the opera house opening. The original is in the McFerrin Collection.

Where is the real Empress Josephine tiara now? In the Houston Museum of Natural Science, as part of the McFerrin Fabergé collection, which is a permanent exhibit there. The museum does not list that particular tiara among the highlights on its exhibit page, so confirm it is on view before travelling for it.

How much does it cost to see the Fabergé collection in Houston? General admission covers it: $25 for adults 12 and over, $16 for children 3 to 11, $16 for seniors 62 and over and military with ID, free under 3. It is free on Tuesdays from 5pm to 8pm.

Who chose the jewellery for The Gilded Age? Costume designer Kasia Walicka-Maimone, who has described building the show's look from period research rather than from a single archive.

What is the cheapest thing from that jeweller? Single studs at $600 each, sold individually. Five pieces in the 34-item catalogue are under $1,000, and they share the textured gold finish that makes the on-screen pieces read as old.

Did the brand release a Gilded Age collection? No. There is no collaboration, no capsule, and no mention of the series anywhere in the shop — not on a product page, not in a tag, not on the homepage. Everything above is ordinary stock.

Prices, stock and admission read from the sellers' and the museum's own pages on 23 August 2026, in the United States market. Screen jewellery moves; if you are reading this much later, treat the figures as a starting point and check the pages linked above.