The Elizabeth Taylor Bulgari Emerald is a 23.46-carat Colombian emerald of exceptional colour saturation, set as the central drop of a platinum and pear-shaped diamond pendant necklace created by Bulgari in 1962. Together with its matching earrings, the suite formed one of the most recognisable jewels in Taylor's legendary collection — a collection that, by the time of its dispersal in December 2011, had come to define the very idea of celebrity gemstone ownership in the modern era. At Christie's New York sale of The Collection of Elizabeth Taylor, the pendant alone realised $6.5 million USD, the earrings a further $2.9 million, and the suite together $9.4 million — figures that reflected not only the intrinsic quality of the stones but the extraordinary cultural weight of their provenance.

The Emerald: Gemmological Character

The central stone is a pear-shaped Colombian emerald weighing 23.46 carats. Colombian emeralds of this size and quality are among the rarest objects in the natural world. The country's principal deposits — Muzo, Chivor, and Coscuez — produce the beryl (Be₃Al₂Si₆O₁₈) that gemmologists and the trade regard as the global benchmark for the species, prized above all for a particular depth and warmth of green that arises from chromium and, to a lesser degree, vanadium colouration. The finest Colombian material exhibits what the trade describes as a slightly bluish to pure green hue with vivid to strong saturation, and the Taylor stone's documented colour places it firmly within that elite tier.

Like virtually all natural emeralds of significant size, the stone almost certainly carries the characteristic internal landscape that gemmologists term the jardin — a French word meaning garden, used to describe the inclusions, fractures, and growth features that are not merely tolerated in emeralds but are understood as evidence of natural origin. In a stone of this weight and provenance, such characteristics are neither a detriment nor a secret; they are part of the geological biography of the crystal. The presence of three-phase inclusions (solid, liquid, and gas co-existing within a single cavity) is a well-documented indicator of Colombian origin and would be expected in material of this provenance.

Emeralds of this calibre are almost universally subjected to clarity enhancement — typically the filling of surface-reaching fractures with cedar oil, synthetic resin, or other substances — a practice that has been standard in the trade for centuries and is disclosed and graded by major gemmological laboratories including the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) and Gübelin Gem Lab. The degree of enhancement present in the Taylor emerald has not been publicly detailed in auction catalogue literature, but any serious assessment of a stone of this importance would include laboratory documentation of its treatment status.

Bulgari: The Roman House and Its Emerald Aesthetic

The pendant and its companion earrings were made by Bulgari — the Roman jewellery house founded by Sotirio Bulgari in 1884 and by the 1960s at the height of its creative and commercial authority. Bulgari's mid-century aesthetic was characterised by bold, architecturally confident settings, a preference for large, saturated coloured stones, and a departure from the more delicate filigree traditions of French haute joaillerie. The house favoured platinum and yellow gold in combination, and its emerald suites of this period frequently featured calibré-cut or pear-shaped diamonds as foils to the central coloured stone, amplifying rather than competing with the colour.

The 1962 pendant exemplifies this approach. The 23.46-carat pear-shaped emerald drop is framed and suspended within a setting of pear-shaped diamonds in platinum, a configuration that allows the emerald to dominate visually while the surrounding white stones provide brilliance and structural elegance. The earrings complement the pendant in design language, creating a suite that reads as a unified statement rather than a collection of separate objects. This coherence of design was central to Bulgari's reputation and to the suite's enduring visual impact.

Elizabeth Taylor and the Bulgari Relationship

Elizabeth Taylor's association with Bulgari began in Rome during the filming of Cleopatra (1963), though her acquisition of individual pieces preceded the film's completion. The relationship between actress and jeweller became one of the most celebrated in the history of twentieth-century jewellery, with Taylor herself reportedly quipping that she had learned Italian from Bulgari — her first word being Bulgari. Whether apocryphal or not, the remark accurately captures the intimacy and frequency of the relationship.

Taylor wore the emerald pendant and earring suite on numerous documented public occasions and regarded it as among her most treasured possessions. In her 2002 book My Love Affair with Jewelry, Taylor wrote about her jewels with a directness and emotional intelligence that distinguished her commentary from mere celebrity endorsement; she understood stones, their histories, and their meanings with a seriousness that commanded respect from the trade. The emerald suite, acquired during one of the most intensely scrutinised periods of her life — the Rome years, the Burton relationship, the global tabloid attention — carried personal significance that transcended its considerable monetary value.

Richard Burton, who became Taylor's fifth and sixth husband, was himself a significant participant in the accumulation of her jewel collection, though the Bulgari emerald suite predates their formal relationship. The broader Burton-Taylor jewellery narrative — encompassing the 69.42-carat Cartier Diamond (later the Taylor-Burton Diamond), the La Peregrina pearl, and the Krupp Diamond — provided the cultural context within which the emerald suite was understood: as one masterwork among many in a collection of genuinely museum-quality importance.

The 2011 Christie's Sale

Following Elizabeth Taylor's death on 23 March 2011, Christie's New York was appointed to conduct the sale of her jewellery, clothing, and decorative arts collection. The jewellery sale, held on 13 and 14 December 2011, was one of the most significant single-owner jewellery auctions in the history of the auction house, generating total proceeds of approximately $137 million across all categories — a figure that shattered pre-sale estimates and established new benchmarks for celebrity-provenance jewellery at auction.

The Bulgari emerald pendant was offered as Lot 46 in the evening sale. Its pre-sale estimate of $2,500,000–$3,500,000 reflected the stone's intrinsic quality and the Bulgari attribution, but the final hammer price of $6.5 million — nearly double the high estimate — demonstrated the premium that Taylor provenance commanded in the marketplace. The earrings, sold separately, realised $2.9 million, bringing the combined total for the suite to $9.4 million.

These results were consistent with a broader pattern observed throughout the sale: Taylor's ownership consistently multiplied the expected value of objects that, on their own merits, were already exceptional. Gemmologists and auction specialists noted that the provenance premium was not irrational — Taylor's collection had been assembled with genuine connoisseurship, was extensively documented, and had been worn and photographed in contexts that gave each piece a visual and historical record far richer than most private collections. The emerald suite had appeared in professional photographs, film stills, and press coverage across five decades, creating an iconographic record that functioned as a form of additional authentication.

Colombian Emeralds of This Calibre: Market Context

To appreciate the significance of a 23.46-carat Colombian emerald of strong colour, it is useful to consider the rarity gradient within the emerald market. While emeralds are produced in Colombia, Zambia, Brazil, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, and a number of other localities, Colombian material — particularly from Muzo — commands consistent premiums at the top of the market. GIA's research and market reporting have documented that fine Colombian emeralds above 10 carats with strong to vivid colour and acceptable clarity are among the rarest coloured gemstones offered at major auction.

Above 20 carats, the population of stones with both fine colour and acceptable transparency becomes extremely small. The combination of size, colour, Colombian origin, Bulgari craftsmanship, and Taylor provenance placed this emerald in a category of perhaps a handful of comparable objects that might appear at public auction in any given decade. The $6.5 million realisation, while extraordinary in absolute terms, was therefore not disproportionate when measured against the convergence of factors that defined the stone's importance.

Per-carat pricing for the pendant — approximately $277,000 per carat at the hammer price — was consistent with, and in some respects below, the per-carat values achieved by comparable Colombian emeralds of strong colour at major sales during the same period, suggesting that the lot was not driven purely by celebrity sentiment but was supported by genuine gemmological value.

Legacy and Significance

The Elizabeth Taylor Bulgari Emerald occupies a particular position in the history of famous gemstones: it is neither the largest emerald ever documented, nor the most historically ancient, nor the most scientifically remarkable. Its significance is instead the product of a convergence — the quality of the stone itself, the artistry of its setting, the identity of its owner, and the cultural moment in which it was worn and eventually sold. In this respect it exemplifies a category of famous gemstone whose importance is inseparable from human narrative.

For gemmologists and jewellery historians, the suite also serves as a document of Bulgari's mid-century design philosophy at its most assured, and as evidence of the degree to which a major coloured stone can accumulate meaning across decades of ownership. The emerald did not change; what changed was the depth of its story. When it passed through Christie's in December 2011, it carried with it not only the geological record of its formation in the Colombian Andes, but half a century of one of the most photographed lives of the twentieth century.

The current private ownership of the pendant and earrings has not been publicly disclosed, which is consistent with the practice of most serious collectors of jewels at this level. The suite remains, in the literature of famous gemstones, one of the defining objects of its era.

Further Reading

• GIA Gems & Gemology — The Jewellery Collection of Elizabeth Taylor (Spring 2012)
• GIA Gem Encyclopedia: Emerald
• Christie's — The Collection of Elizabeth Taylor