Brand legacy

The newly opened Gucci Museo in Florence shows the history – however edited – of one of the world's most famous fashion houses. DEIRDRE MCQUILLANpays it a visit

YOU DON’T EXPECT to see Samuel Beckett at a fashion exhibition, but there he is in the newly opened Gucci Museo in Florence, with a Gucci horse bit shoulder bag slung over his Aran sweater, gazing thoughtfully down at the ground.

That photograph, taken in 1971 in Genoa, is just one example of the hundreds of celebrities and high-watt names wearing Gucci on display at the museum, housed in an historic 14th-century palazzo a few minutes walk from the Uffizi in Piazza Signoria in the centre of the city. On a recent visit, it was packed, with a group of about 40 French students, all agog, touring it with a guide.

Fashion exhibitions continue to ignite widespread public interest and 2011 was marked by incredible attendance numbers clocked up at the Alexander McQueen retrospective at the Met in New York – almost 700,000 people saw the show by the time it ended in August. Big luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, Bulgari and Chanel, quick to see the trend, have been mounting their own exhibitions at major museums in emerging markets such as China, using them to control and promote their heritage.

Gucci Museo draws on the company’s vast archive and leather goods legacy stretching back to 1921 when the company was founded by Guccio Gucci in Florence. As a penniless teenager, the young Tuscan – forced to emigrate after his father’s business went bankrupt – found work as a bell boy in the Savoy Hotel in London. Having observed the comings and goings and luxury trappings of international wealth, he returned home and opened a little workshop specialising in travel accessories. He had noticed the importance of sporting interests among a well-heeled clientele and equestrian motifs, such as brass horse bits, stirrups and girth straps, became emblematic of the brand.

Housed on the first floor of the stone building are the bags that made Gucci famous: the saddle shaped Bamboo with its curved handle; the Web, ingeniously adapted from a girth strap in the red and green Gucci colours; the Horse Bit, the double ring brass motif that later embellished the bestselling Gucci loafers (84,000 pairs were sold alone in one year in the US in 1969); and the GG, with the initials originally forged in Florence and later woven as a pattern into cotton canvas for its luggage. A showstopper, however, is the Gucci Cadillac Seville, in all its pristine glory, its studded leather interior carrying the GG logo and its boot filled with suitcases. The French group all but crowded into its interior.

The brainchild of Gucci’s current creative director Frida Giannini, the museum mixes past and present, with some of the famous brand’s most precious objects and hidden treasures, and an area dedicated to modern art from the collection of François-Henri Pinault, chief executive of PPR, the luxury company that owns Gucci. The day I was there, it was showing a compelling 20-minute installation by Bill Viola, the US video artist, depicting a body being consumed by fire, and another by water. Another room shows iconic Italian movies such as The Leopard, La Dolce Vita and Wanda, at different times daily.

Up close elsewhere, you can see some glamorous red-carpet dresses such as the one worn by Hilary Swank this year at the Academy Awards – all chiffon, crystal and feathers, and the embroidered silk gown worn by Naomi Watts at Cannes in 2010. On the second floor there’s a focus on sport, with Gucci picnic baskets, surfboards, saddles, fins and even bicycles against a soundtrack of thwacked tennis balls.

The museum, which had a lavish opening in September, is a curious mix, in its own way absorbing and interesting, though also remarkable for what it leaves out. There is little mention of the family’s rollercoaster history, its transformation by Tom Ford and Domenico de Sole in the 1990s, nor of the people who make it what it is today nor the craftsmanship behind the product.

But on a wet and rainy day in Florence, it is a momentary escape into another world and it does have a good fashion bookshop at the entrance, along with expensive Gucci trinkets.

The chic little café on the ground floor remains open from 10am to 11pm every day while the museum itself opens daily from 10am-8pm, admission €6.