"Come with me, and you'll be in a world of pure imagination!" Anything is possible in the wonderful, whimsical world of Willy Wonka. That includes creating a glittering necklace that looks like a too-good-to-be-true, candy-coated confection but is real and consists of hundreds of gemstones. While walking the red carpet at the world premiere of Wonka at London’s Royal Festival Hall, Timothée Chalamet debuted a candy necklace that Cartier custom-made for the new chocolatier-in-chief.
The colorful choker features 964 emeralds, rubellites, pink tourmalines, and blue opals, per Vogue. "It's insane, right?" Chalamet told the publication a day prior to the screening. “It’s beyond anything I could have dreamt,” the actor said of the custom-made beauty that took around 450 hours to craft.
Chalamet, a Cartier ambassador, worked for months with the legacy jewelry house to design the piece, even spending time combing through the jewelry archives to source inspiration. “The house has such success with their staples," he told Vogue. "My one curiosity was what something joyful and playful and youthful would look like under the umbrella of a Cartier creation.” The end result after hours of combining history and letting Chalamet's imagination run wild? A stunning, bonafide one-of-a-kind number that resembles a high-end Nerds rope necklace—and really, that does feel like the perfect piece of jewelry for the young Wonka to accessorize with.
Oh, yes—the rest of his look! With his Cartier candy necklace, Chalamet wore a deep magenta, crushed velvet suit and chestnut brown ankle boots. Chalamet's two-piece suited ensemble, which he wore sans undershirt (the Certified Fashion Girly loves a flash of skin), will remind any fashion nerd of another iconic velvet number: Gwyneth Paltrow's ruby red suit designed by Tom Ford for Gucci that she wore to the 1996 VMAs.
Chalamet's candy necklace and bright suit are his latest killer look from his Wonka press tour. Earlier this week, he wore a pinstriped Alexander McQueen ensemble that featured a Wonka-esque tailcoat and quirky peplum silhouette. In Tokyo a few weeks ago, Chalamet donned a black latex trench coat (did he pull influence from girlfriend Kylie Jenner's Khy?) at the airport, only to change into an iridescent, digital lavender suit by Prada.
Now that Chalamet's covered opulent gemstones, electric color palettes, and unconventional materials (latex? really?), we can only wonder what's next for the Wonka star. Perhaps a chocolate-inspired number next? Or something orange in homage to a trusty and hardworking Oompa Loompa? Remember: "Take a look, and you'll see into your imagination!"
