Louvre reopens Apollo Gallery without crown jewels

Gallery reopens without jewels

Culture Minister Catherine Pégard attended the reopening on Wednesday, the first time the gallery has opened since the October 2025 heist, TimesLIVE reported. Visitors can tour the room’s gilded ceilings and Greek frescoes en route to the nearby Mona Lisa, but they will not see crown jewels or empty display cases. The museum has removed the collections and precious objects that were displayed there, its director Christophe Leribault said. The former exhibits will move elsewhere in the museum, TimesLIVE reported. The gallery has returned to its 17th-century function as a state gallery.

The Louvre is the world’s most visited museum, with around nine million visitors a year, AFP reported. Leribault called the reopening “also an opportunity to rediscover the splendid architecture and decor of this gallery.” Pégard said the day the pieces were taken “cannot be forgotten, and I believe it should not be.” She described the theft as “a trauma for us, discovering the fragility of a place we thought unshakeable.” The room was built for a young Louis XIV and decorated by Charles Le Brun around the theme of the sun, Global News reported.

What was stolen, and what was left

On 19 October 2025, masked thieves disguised as construction workers used a truck-mounted basket lift to reach the second-floor gallery about 30 minutes after the museum opened, with visitors already inside, Global News reported. They cut through a window, smashed two display cases and took crown jewels valued at 88 million euros, or $102 million. NBC News reported nine pieces were taken; AFP reported eight. The accounts differ. NBC News put the raid at just seven minutes, while Global News said it lasted less than seven minutes. The thieves fled on scooters driven by two accomplices. Global News said the robbery unfolded about 250 metres from the Mona Lisa. The burglary revealed major security lapses at the museum, AFP reported.

Investigators have said they are puzzled why the thieves left behind the 140-carat Regent diamond, valued at $60 million, NBC News reported. Empress Eugénie’s emerald-set imperial crown, which held more than 1,300 diamonds, was dropped outside and found broken. The stolen jewels remain unrecovered nine months later, except the crown, Global News reported. Alexandre Giquello, president of the Drouot auction house, told Reuters the crown alone was worth “several tens of millions of euros.” Four people suspected of direct involvement have been charged and are in custody, Global News reported.

Security plan and an unbuilt vault

Since the theft the Louvre has added surveillance cameras and anti-intrusion systems, TimesLIVE reported. A parliamentary commission on museum security said in mid-May that security issues at the Louvre had been pushed into the background in recent years, AFP reported. Pégard pledged to increase security at museums across France, Global News reported.

The security work sits inside the decade-long Louvre New Renaissance plan, worth 800 million euros or $933 million, launched in 2025 to modernise infrastructure and ease crowding. It also includes a dedicated gallery for the Mona Lisa by 2031.

For the jewels that were not stolen, Leribault said the museum will create “a secure room, a vault with no windows, in another part of the museum.” “It’s a major construction project and we have to find the ideal location. And the funding,” he added. France’s state auditors have questioned the museum’s low spending on security and infrastructure maintenance while it bought new artwork, only a quarter of which is open to the public, Reuters reported. Laurence des Cars resigned as Louvre president after the heist and a string of failures, and Leribault was named to lead the museum in February, TimesLIVE reported.