Zoe Saldaña arrived at the 98th Academy Awards as someone who had every reason to walk that red carpet with extra confidence. The 47-year-old actress returned to the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles as a presenter for the evening, and her fashion choice matched the moment precisely. She wore a sultry, lingerie-inspired lace slip dress by Saint Laurent that balanced delicacy with impact in the way only the best red carpet dressing manages to do. The gown’s intricate lace construction gave it a sense of couture craftsmanship while its slip silhouette kept the overall feel modern and assured rather than ornate.
The look was completed with a Cartier piece featuring 19 carats of diamonds, an addition that elevated the understated nature of the dress without overpowering it. Hairstylist Aviva Perea crafted a soft, sophisticated updo that pulled attention upward toward the jewelry and the neckline, while a neutral, clean makeup palette allowed the intricacy of the lace itself to remain the visual focal point of the ensemble. It was a masterclass in editing, trusting a single strong garment to carry the entire moment rather than layering on competing elements.
The evening carried symbolic weight because it came one year after Saldaña’s history-making acceptance speech at the 2025 ceremony, where she became the first American of Dominican origin to win an Academy Award, taking home Best Supporting Actress for her role in ‘Emilia Pérez.’ In her speech she said, “I am a proud child of immigrant parents with dreams and dignity and hard-working hands, and I am the first American of Dominican origin to accept an Academy Award,” a moment that was widely cited as one of the most moving of that entire awards season. She also spoke of the “quiet heroism” of her character, connecting her personal heritage to the story she had been trusted to tell on screen.
Returning to the ceremony a year later in a presenting capacity rather than a competing one gave the evening a different kind of energy for her, one of consolidation rather than anticipation. Saldaña has been building toward this kind of standing in Hollywood for years, with her career now encompassing some of the most commercially successful film franchises in the history of cinema. As of this year she holds a remarkable distinction: she is officially the highest-grossing film actor of all time, with her cumulative filmography having generated more than $16.8 billion at the worldwide box office. That figure is driven in large part by her central roles in the ‘Avatar’ series, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the ‘Star Trek’ franchise, three of the biggest properties in modern blockbuster culture.
She recently appeared in ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash,’ the third installment of James Cameron’s saga, and is already committed to ‘Avatar 4’ and ‘Avatar 5’ as the franchise continues its long-range expansion. Beyond the franchise work, she is set to star opposite Matthew McConaughey in the romantic caper ‘Positano,’ which is expected to begin production later this year, suggesting she has no intention of slowing down in either the prestige or the commercial lane of her career.
What makes Saldaña’s continued ascent particularly striking is that she has managed to maintain genuine critical credibility alongside the blockbuster dominance. Most actors who become synonymous with franchise behemoths find their awards track record diverging from their box office one. She has kept both moving upward simultaneously, which is a rarer achievement than it sounds and speaks to a range of instincts about role selection that most people in her position do not consistently demonstrate.
Lace as a textile has been produced by hand in the town of Bruges, Belgium, since the 15th century, and at its peak in the 17th century it was considered so valuable that it was bequeathed in wills alongside silver and land. Cartier, the house behind Saldaña’s 19-carat diamond piece, has a relationship with Hollywood that stretches back to the 1930s, when it became one of the first jewelers to lend pieces directly to studios for use in films, a practice that essentially invented the modern red carpet jewelry loan. Saint Laurent, the house behind her dress, was founded by Yves Saint Laurent in 1961 and is widely credited with introducing the tuxedo suit for women in 1966, a move that permanently shifted the vocabulary of women’s formal dressing.
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