The Luxury Brands keeping High-Profile Monuments Alive

When Notre Dame cathedral in Paris was severely damaged by fire in 2019 the shock reverberated throughout France — and beyond. However, it’s expected that by the end of this year the restoration will be advanced enough to allow visitors and worshippers to return.

Among those celebrating will be two of France’s most famous companies. Within weeks of the fire both LVMH and Kering came forward to offer their financial support for the restoration project. Bernard Arnault, founder and CEO of LVMH and France’s wealthiest man, signed an agreement with the Fondation Notre Dame to donate €200 million, while fellow billionaire François Pinault and his son Francois-Henri contributed €100 million.

Other luxury brands are also supporting the restoration of historic monuments. Dior is involved in a five-year partnership with the Louvre to help restore the Tuileries garden. Chanel has spent €25 million restoring the Grand Palais; for the past few years the brand has used the vast Belle Époque exhibition space as a venue for runway shows.

Under the guidance of Benjamin Mouton, France’s chief architect of historic monuments, Kering has spent years and millions of euros renovating 40 rue de Sèvres, its 17th-century headquarters in Paris. The gardens that surround the building have been painstakingly reconstructed using historical documents and drawings.

In Italy, Bulgari has donated €1.5 million towards the renovation of the Spanish Steps, while another hugely popular Roman tourist attraction, the Trevi fountain, was completely overhauled thanks to funding by Fendi of over €2 million. Also in Rome, Tod’s has spent the past decade supporting a vast project, together with Rome’s archaeological heritage department, aimed at restoring the Colosseum to its former glory.

Heritage, craftmanship and aesthetics — the parallels between luxury brands and historic monuments are obvious. Restoration projects provide luxury houses with unique, high-profile opportunities to promote these qualities. As a humble punter, you might not be able to buy their products, but you can wander around a building, a cathedral, a garden or a neighbourhood that they’ve restored and given new life.

“The luxury and heritage industries are associated with the celebration and preservation of craftsmanship and by expanding their reach to the restoration of landmarks, they weave themselves into the narrative of tradition and timeless allure," says Ewald Damen, creative director and managing partner at interior design studio Virgile + Partners.

Needless to say, there are commercial and branding benefits. Data from influencer analytics platform WeArisma shows that the total media value of Chanel’s partnership with the Grand Palais, for instance, amounted to $23,832,829 after 1,517 influencers, celebrities and press created 3,676 pieces of content. LVMH’s support for Notre Dame was widely shared on social media, generating a total media value of $2,358,288 as a result of 224 pieces of content shared by 181 influencers. In particular, supermodels Cara Delevingne and Natalia Vodianova both shared LVMH’s statement on Instagram, at a combined media value of $1,333,134.

Venetian Heritage, a foundation that works to preserve the city’s art, architecture, literature, and music, has worked with a number of luxury brands including Dior, Louis Vuitton, Bulgari and watch brand Vernier to raise funds and awareness for its projects. This spring, during the opening of Biennale Arte, Venetian Heritage and Dior will continue their collaboration with a gala event in Venice, in a venue that has never been open to the public before.

Dior and Venetian Heritage also held a gala dinner in Venice’s Teatro La Fenice in 2022, during the Biennale Arte opening week, to support the foundation’s work on the restoration of the Ca’ d’Oro museum. Attendees included actors Rosamund Pike and Catherine Deneuve, and aristo-model Beatrice Casiraghi, all of whom wore Dior gowns. The two organisations have worked closely together since 2019, and their association goes back to 1951 when Christian Dior himself attended Le Bal Oriental at the Palazzo Labia along with over a thousand of society’s smartest and wealthiest including Orson Welles, Salvador Dalí and Pierre Cardin.

In 2019 Dior and Venetian Heritage recreated what became known as the “party of the century”, this time attended by Tilda Swinton, Monica Bellucci and Sienna Miller, among many others, to raise funds for a variety of conservation and restoration projects in and around Venice.

Venetian Heritage has also recently partnered with jewellery house Pomellato to create the Lights and Reflections project, which illuminated the historical façade of the Galleria Giorgio Franchetti alla Ca’ d’Oro. As well as bringing a state-of-the-art lighting project with low environmental impact to the palace’s openwork marble façade, Pomellato celebrated the unveiling of this new initiative with the creation of the Venetian Dream necklace. Featuring rose gold and diamonds, the piece was inspired by the ornate details of the building.

“As a foundation we can’t spend funds on the organisation of events as our funds have to go towards our mission. That means that we need to find other organisations that can help us with finance,” explains Toto Bergamo Rossi, director of Venetian Heritage. “Dior is the perfect partner for us because of its links with Venice going back to Le Bal Oriental.

It’s very much about personal contact. I know Pietro Beccari, former Chairman and CEO of Christian Dior Couture and now chair and CEO of Louis Vuitton, and so I asked him if the companies could help with events and fundraising, and they said ‘yes’.”

Venetian Heritage, a not-for-profit, avoids commercial activity, and visibility for brands around its projects is low-key. “We don’t do banners,” says Bergamo Rossi. There’s a clear division of labour. “Our partners take care of the events and the administration while we concentrate on what we do best — I’m a restorer, not a fund raiser, after all. What we have in common is an appreciation of beauty, craftmanship and heritage.”

It’s not just centuries-old buildings and monuments that are enjoying the largesse of luxury brands. The former British Embassy in Madrid is a celebration of 1960s Brutalism. In 2022 it was revamped by Cartier as a venue for the maison’s Beautés du Monde high jewellery collection. Cartier is also supporting the restoration of Teatro Verde, a unique amphitheatre that was built in the mid 1950s and is set below sea level amid the wooded landscape of the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, located off the coast of Venice.

A love of the natural world and an appreciation of harmony and balance lie at the heart of a collaboration between The King’s Foundation, a charity, and jeweller Van Cleef & Arpels to maintain and enhance the gardens of Dumfries House and the Castle and Gardens of Mey in Scotland, as well as the Highgrove Gardens in England.

The maison will “enable the continued management of the extensive estate, including the formal gardens, as well as woodland and hedgerow creation schemes,” says Nicolas Bos, president and CEO of Van Cleef & Arpels. “This will ensure that the gardens continue to be a valuable and accessible asset for local communities and visitors alike. Van Cleef & Arpels has celebrated nature as a major source of inspiration. The maison has translated this universe in many ways throughout its history, in its jewellery creations, of course, but also through artistic collaborations, exhibitions and events.”

As cash-strapped governments are forced to rein in spending on arts and heritage, and luxury brands feel the need to emphasise their credentials as good corporate citizens, these collaborations will almost certainly increase. But both parties need to think carefully about approach.

The King’s Foundation offers three criteria for a successful collaboration: “Firstly, the key to any brand relationship is to understand each other’s objectives and use those areas of commonality as the foundation of your work together. Secondly, it is about understanding areas of challenge in each other’s business and seeking creative solutions that provide mutual benefit. Thirdly, it’s about communication and being open and honest about your limitations — but also about your dreams and aspirations.”

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