This year, several jewelry houses showed special collections in conjunction with the Haute Couture. These Haute Joaillerie presentations were held on the spectacular place Vendôme – one of my favorite spots in all of Paris. I wrote about the jewels at Boucheron, Dior and Chanel – now watch the video for a closer look and to hear more about the stories that inspired them…

I thought the Boucheron and Cirque du Soleil collaboration was pretty unusual. The Elvis necklace is a very dramatic piece – it shows his love of gold – and the contour of the necklace is modeled after his famous hairstyle. It’ll be featured in Las Vegas when the new Cirque du Soliel show opens there. Look out for some of the other necklaces from this special collection at performances around the world.

I love the fantastical designs of Victoire de Castellane at Dior. She is on another level.

And lastly, Chanel showed classic but chic jewels. There’s some great insight on the collection in the video above – in 1932, Coco Chanel designed a jewelry piece shaped like a star and made of all platinum and diamonds. This has been a main source of inspiration for the company, and more renditions of Madame Chanel’s work from this era have been created – stars, fringe and ribbon designs – and they’re all made of diamonds. Of course, no Chanel jewelry collection would be complete without pearls – though the necklace we saw is interlaced with diamonds, too. They were all so beautiful – rings with over 18 karats of gemstone, a cuff so full of sparkle it was called a dream catcher…but I think I’ll take the pearl necklace with the pink and purple cabochons – gorgeous. Click above to get a look.