Louis Vuitton’s Cruise 2026 Collection To Be Showcased in France’s Historic Palais des Papes
Nicolas Ghesquière is gearing up to debut Louis Vuitton’s cruise 2026 collection on May 22 at the Palais des Papes, a noted UNESCO World Heritage site located in Avignon, France. This historic monument, known for its stunning Gothic architecture, will be serving as the venue for a fashion show for the first time.
The French luxury fashion house stated that it would assist in funding a local project devoted to lighting up the facades of the buildings surrounding the squares. These include the Palais des Papes itself, a cathedral, the Petit Palais, the Hôtel des Monnaies, and the Hotel Calvet de la Palun. Louis Vuitton released a statement, saying the initiative aims to “enhance the monumental architecture and ensure the safety of the roadways around the square.”
The fashion brand remains committed to supporting local heritage and community projects in cities where it organizes cruise shows, a tradition that it plans to continue with the upcoming event.
While the date of Louis Vuitton’s show was announced earlier, the location was kept a secret until now. According to the Palais des Papes’ official website, Benedict XII and Clement VI, both successors of John XII, mainly led the creation of this architectural masterpiece. The works began under Benedict XII’s rule in 1335, and the papacy returned to Rome in 1377.
Ghesquière, appointed as the artistic director of women’s collections at Louis Vuitton in 2013, has a habit of choosing architectural wonders for the settings of the cruise shows. In 2025, he selected Barcelona’s otherworldly Park Güell, designed by renowned modernist architect Antoni Gaudí. For the 2023 show, he picked the quaint Isola Bella, a small island on Lake Maggiore owned by the Borromeo family for more than four centuries.
Previous Louis Vuitton cruise shows have been hosted at a wide array of locations, such as California’s Bob Hope estate designed by John Lautner, Brazil’s Museum of Contemporary Art Niterói by Oscar Niemeyer, Kyoto’s Miho Museum by Ieoh Ming Pei, the Fondation Maeght in Saint-Paul de Vence by Josep Lluís Sert and the iconic TWA Flight Center at JFK Airport in New York by Eero Saarinen.