“From the Heart to the Hands: Dolce & Gabbana,” an opulent exhibition dedicated to the brand’s high fashion collections, was consistently sold out over its five-month run last year at the Palazzo Reale in Milan. Beyond all the decadence and dolce vita, the show was on home turf, all but guaranteeing blockbuster success. Tomorrow, newly christened in French, “Du Cœur à la Main” makes a magnificent encore in Paris, filling a wing of galleries within the Grand Palais. How will it fare in the birthplace of haute couture?
Presented as a 10-part thematic journey through Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana’s Alta Moda (fashion), Alta Sartoria (tailoring), and Alta Gioiellleria (jewelry) designs since introducing their fatto a mano (handmade) approach in 2012, the exhibition is nearly identical to the original. When it opened last April, my Milan-based counterpart, Tiziana Cardini wrote up a vivid walkthrough, with Gabbana telling her that Alta Moda exists “to give ourselves the gift of unlimited creativity.”
Ensuring a seamless execution across the two cities is renowned curator, professor, and historian, Florence Müller, who has been involved in more than 150 exhibitions around the world and conceived the dazzling “Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams,” which raised the bar (forgive me) for museum experiences of fashion.
Amidst the installation of multi-media, cinematic scenography by Agence Galuchat with production juiced up by IMG, Müller was on hand to provide Vogue with an exclusive tour of the Paris iteration. This begins with the newly restored rotunda entrance where digital displays of various inspirations put a futuristic spin on the forthcoming craft. Up a few flights of stairs is the most obvious homage to Paris: a full-length black tunic fronted with an Eiffel Tower in shimmering embroidery and strass, the garment deliberately unfinished as though nabbed from the atelier.
We proceed through each of the main rooms and anterooms, the conversation flowing as soundscapes—heartbeats, Verdi, Vivaldi, even broken glass—and scent-scapes corresponding to the designers’ ambition when staging the Alta Moda runway shows: the more immersive and sensory, the better. Meanwhile, across the 200-plus creations on display, elaborate workmanship depicts saints, Renaissance masterpieces, folkloric motifs, architectural marvels—every hand-embellished surface revealing the seemingly endless fount of Italian historical and cultural references.
We have spent well over an hour together by the time we reach the end, and when I ask Müller how long most visitors will spend discovering this Dolce & Gabbana fantasy world, she says two hours would not be unreasonable. In any case, with the exhibition opening ahead of the men’s and haute outure weeks and closing not long after the women’s ready-to-wear, it delivers a made-in-Italy fashion feast that is all about the oh là là. Here, some insights from Müller.
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