For the reopening, the museum removed all items and display cases in the gallery
Credit: LOU BENOIST / POOL / AFP via Getty
NEED TO KNOW
- The Louvre’s Apollo Gallery reopened on Wednesday, July 22
- The reopening occurred nine months after thieves conducted a $100 million jewel heist
- For the reopening, the museum removed all items and display cases in the gallery
The Louvre reopened its Apollo Gallery (Galerie d’Apollon) on Wednesday, July 22.
The public reopening comes nine months after thieves broke into the famous Paris museum and stole more than $100 million in jewels on Oct. 18.
The Louvre Museum removed all items and display cases in the gallery, ABC News reported, citing a Louvre Museum press release. The decision came as the museum seeks to make the gallery regain its “stately purpose” as a work of art, and so that it can “restore the painted and sculpted wall decorations to their rightful place.”
Credit: LOU BENOIST / POOL / AFP via Getty
The infamous jewel heist was executed in seven minutes. Initially, two suspects were arrested on Oct. 26. Several days later, on Oct. 29, five more suspects were arrested in a Paris suburb.
Nearly a month later, on Nov. 25, an additional four suspects were arrested. Since then, six of the suspects have been released from detention; the remaining four are awaiting trial, per ABC News.
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The thieves took nine pieces: a sapphire tiara, a sapphire necklace and a single sapphire earring worn by Queen Marie-Amélie and Queen Hortense; a matching emerald necklace and emerald earrings worn by Marie-Louise (Napoleon Bonaparte’s second wife); a tiara and large brooch that belonged to Empress Eugénie; and a brooch known as the “reliquary brooch.” Empress Eugénie’s crown made from gold, emeralds, and diamonds was also stolen, but the thieves dropped it outside the museum during their escape. It has since been recovered.
The remaining stolen items are still missing, Reuters reports.
The jewelry that was not stolen and was previously in the Apollo Gallery is now housed in a different part of the museum. The jewels are in a secure vault with no windows, President of the Louvre Museum Christophe Leribault said, per ABC News.
The Apollo Gallery will return to its original purpose as a reception gallery. In 1661, French King Louis XIV commissioned architect Louis Le Vau and painter Charles Le Brun to create a space that reflected how he resonated with the sun god Apollo. Architect Félix Duban completed it two centuries later, in 1850, according to the museum.
It would also inspire the six-year creation of the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles — which was completed between 1678 and 1684.
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