A groom's mother called me last week with what she thought was an emergency. Her son had three sherwani options laid out on the bed, and she needed me to pick. I looked at the photos, and honestly, any of the three would have worked beautifully. What I actually asked her to send next was a photo of his jewelry pile. That is where the real decision was hiding, and she had not even thought to mention it.
This is the shift I keep having to explain to families this wedding season. For years, groom styling meant choosing the outfit and calling it done: safa on the head, mojaris on the feet, maybe a brooch if we were feeling fancy. But 2026 has quietly rewritten that math. The palette this season has gone soft, ivory, beige, taupe, soft grey, the kind of quiet luxury tones that used to be a bride's territory. And when you take a groom out of red and gold and put him in something this restrained, his jewelry stops being an accessory and becomes the whole point.
The Aesthetic: Layering, Not Loading Up
What I am styling most right now is not one heavy necklace but two or three pieces worn together with real intention. Think a gemstone mala sitting close to the collarbone, a longer rudraksha or sandalwood strand underneath it, and sometimes a third, finer chain doing almost nothing except catching light. It reads less like costume jewelry and more like the way a well-dressed man layers his rings or his watch straps: considered, a little personal, never matched too perfectly.
I had a groom in Udaipur this month in an open-collar cream kurta with almost no embroidery at all, and we built his entire look around three strands of green and gold beads sitting at different lengths against that plain cream. People kept asking where his dupatta went. Nobody asked about the dupatta once they saw the jewelry. That is the trade I am making with grooms now: less on the fabric, more around the neck.
Sabyasachi's heritage jewelry line has done a great deal to normalize this for men, proving that a groom can wear something with real weight and history and still look like himself, not like he borrowed his grandfather's puja box for the day. And with fabric choices leaning toward brocade bandhgala achkans, angrakha-style sherwanis with that crossed front, and Jodhpuri suits for the more indo-western function, a neutral base is exactly the kind of quiet backdrop that lets a serious piece of jewelry actually be seen.
The Stylist's Touch: Where I Draw the Line
The rule I give every groom is simple: odd numbers, uneven lengths, and one hero piece that everything else supports rather than competes with. Two necklaces of the same length sitting flat against each other look like a costume rental. Three strands falling at slightly different points look like they were collected over years, even when we bought them all the same week.
I also think hard about which function we are dressing for. A Haldi or Mehendi call for something lighter, a single mala, maybe rudraksha with a small gemstone accent, nothing that will swing around while he is being pulled into a dance circle. The Pheras are where I let a groom go heavier, a proper temple-style piece or a polki-inspired strand that holds its own next to whatever his bride is wearing, because by that ceremony the two of them are finally being styled as a pair, not as separate stories. And for the reception, I will often strip the neck back down to one clean piece, because by then the jacket or the tuxedo is doing the talking and the jewelry just needs to finish the sentence, not start a new one.
Metal tone matters more than people expect too. If his sherwani has gold zardozi, I keep the jewelry in that same warm family rather than mixing in silver or oxidised pieces, unless we are deliberately going for a more rustic, festival-adjacent look, which some of my Sangeet grooms genuinely want this year.
Turbans, Brooches and the Smaller Details
None of this replaces the safa or the pagdi, it just changes how we finish it. Pearl and stone work on turban jewels is having a real moment, small kalgi brooches with a single stone rather than the full ornate crest, and cufflinks in matching gemstones so the whole look feels connected from his collar to his wrist rather than three separate decisions made in three separate shops. Statement shoes have earned their own attention this season as well, and I have started asking grooms to bring their mojaris or juttis to the jewelry fitting, because a green gemstone strand looks entirely different next to plain ivory mojaris than it does next to embroidered ones.
I am also seeing more grooms ask for pieces that mean something, a mala that belonged to a grandfather, a pendant reworked from a mother's old jewelry. That instinct is exactly right. The best groom jewelry I style rarely comes from a single showroom trip. It comes from combining one or two heirloom pieces with something new, so the whole thing tells a story instead of just performing wealth.
The SGK Philosophy
I always tell my grooms the same thing: your wardrobe is not a smaller, quieter version of your bride's, it is its own creative project, and I am the Creative Director of that project just as much as I am hers. Jewelry is where a lot of men finally let themselves have an opinion about their own wedding styling, because it feels personal rather than performative, and I love watching that happen in a fitting room.
Here is what I want every groom and every family reading this to walk away with:
Choose one hero jewelry piece first, then build one or two supporting strands around it, never the reverse.
Keep metal tones consistent with your outfit's embroidery unless you are deliberately styling a rustic, festive look.
Save your heaviest piece for the Pheras, dress lighter for Haldi and Mehendi, and simplify again for the reception.
Bring your footwear to your jewelry fitting. Mojaris and juttis change how a necklace reads far more than people expect.
Ask your family about heirloom pieces before buying anything new. One inherited strand instantly elevates a brand new outfit.
If you are staring at three sherwani options on a bed right now and feeling like something is still missing, it probably is, and it is likely hanging in a box somewhere in your family home rather than sitting on a store shelf. I would love to help you find it and build the rest of the look around it.
With love and style,
Shreya Gupta Kedia
Founder, SGK Styles
