As the need for high-efficiency optoelectronic devices continues to grow, ZnO has emerged as one of the most promising materials for tunable optical emissions. With a wide direct bandgap of 3.37 eV and a large exciton binding energy of 60 meV, ZnO is a more thermally stable near-UV emitter than the commonly used semiconductor GaN. It is the focus of this research to study the physics of using plasmonics and optical cavity effects to tune and enhance the emission of ZnO within a high-quality, three-dimensional nanowire architecture. By uniformly functionalizing ZnO nanowires with metal nanoparticles (Ag, Au, and Al), it is possible to greatly enhance or quench the emission of ZnO via plasmonic coupling to the luminescent centers. In addition, coating ZnO nanowires with specific thicknesses of an insulator layer has yielded optical cavity effects via Fabry-Perot resonators inside the core-shell structures, further enhancing the band-edge luminescence. This research has the potential to establish the core-shell plasmonic ZnO nanowire structure as a high-efficiency platform for optoelectronic applications.