SerpApi.Org
Nine months after thieves made off with $102 million worth of French crown jewels in one of the most audacious museum heists in recent memory, the Louvre’s Apollo Gallery opened its doors to the public again today, July 22. However, while the room’s gilded walls, frescoes on the ceilings, and other ornate architectural details are on full display, the remaining jewels and display cases that once held them are all gone.
As reported in May, the Louvre announced the gallery’s surviving contents would be relocated to a quieter wing of the museum. The Louvre’s new director, Christophe Leribault, described to Le Monde told that he plans to make Empress Eugénie’s crown, the only recovered item from the burglary, the centerpiece of a new permanent display in a less congested part of the museum once it has been fully restored.
The robbery took place on the morning of October 19, 2025, roughly an hour after the Louvre opened to the public. According to investigators and video surveillance footage that has since been released to the media, four suspects arrived at the museum in a truck fitted with a cherry picker, used a boom lift to reach the balcony of the Apollo Gallery on the second floor of the museum, and broke through a reinforced window using angle grinders. The thieves allegedly cut into two display cases and removed eight pieces of jewelry, including tiaras, a brooch, necklaces, and earrings. Empress Eugénie’s diamond and emerald crown was dropped during the escape, but found just outside of the museum on the same day. The remaining eight pieces have still not been found.
The case took a new turn this month when two of the four suspects broke their silence in statements made to French judicial authorities in June and published by Le Monde. The two men said they were recruited days before the robbery by an unnamed figure, who they claim was present at the museum that morning and directed the operation. Both said they were withholding the mastermind’s identity out of fear for their families.
