Every suitcase has a story. Objects have voices - if only we tune into their frequency: they speak of each material that went into their composition, each hand that crafted them, each journey they’ve made, each life that’s been lived around them. 

These are the words that enrapture the exhibition-goer as they enter the second immersive room, titled Portals, of the Italian fashion house Gucci’s Gucci Cosmos exhibition. In homage to one of Gucci’s first products of notoriety, the suitcase, the passage immediately positions the audience as travelers set to embark on a journey through the Gucci narrative. The showing, located at 180 Studios on The Strand, a major thoroughfare in London, seeks to integrate the ordinary fashion consumer into the world and history of Gucci’s 102-year existence. It is sectioned into nine rooms - The Ascending Room, Portals, Eden, Zoetrope, Two, Archivio, Cabinet of Wonders, Carousel, and Gucci Ancora - each curated with a surreal, grandiose, and expressive display of the Gucci brand. The objective of the rooms, each working collaboratively as a continuation of the one prior, is to contribute to the atmosphere of a Gucci universe; a series of inner workings revolving around all things Gucci to create a cosmos of sorts. 

Stage artist and designer Es Devlin is credited as the lead curator of Gucci Cosmos, cited with envisioning the Gucci brand as 4-D immersive worlds within the capacity of her expansive imagination. Devlin’s work is renowned for some of the biggest contemporary artistic stages in recent years, in which she notably designed sets and experiences for musical powerhouse Beyoncé’s Renaissance and Formation World Tours, for mega-rappers Kanye and Jay-Z, for events such as the Superbowl Halftime Show 2022, 2012 Olympics, and Coachella, and for a plethora of other presentations and exhibitions at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Tate Modern, for Yves Saint Laurent, Dior, Louis Vuitton, and numerous others. In consideration of Devlin’s stellar portfolio, it follows that Devlin, in tandem with fashion theorist Maria Luisa Frisa, was chosen to curate Gucci Cosmos, having direct oversight for what Gucci archival pieces were selected and how they would be visually communicated. Through the use of larger than life sculptures, video, lighting, sound, rotating and shifting mechanics, projections, illustrative imagery and language, and Gucci products, Devlin formulates an experience that makes the viewer a tangible part of the Gucci chronology. 

Gucci Cosmos is a traveling exhibition that initially commenced in Shanghai. After the success of its Shanghai launch, Gucci saw it fitting to pinpoint the brand’s journey at its next location in London, as the initiation of the house has inextricable ties to the perennial English capital.

Enter The Ascending Room, the first of the nine immersions of Gucci’s Italian cosmos, where Devlin has re-constructed an early-20th century interior of an elevator in London’s historic The Savoy Hotel. In 1921, Guccio Gucci, a young pioneer who would go on to establish the iconic Gucci label as we know it today, began his career as a porter at The Savoy Hotel. Lifting and transporting the luggages of The Savoy’s esteemed guests, Gucci developed the idea of having luggage adorned with his namesake and emblem. Ambitious and far beyond his time, Gucci would soon return to his native Florence, Italy and enlist his family in helping him create a system of logos and visuals that would eventually birth the Gucci identity and the timeless double-g (GG) monogram. It was within the red lacquered walls of The Savoy’s elevators, beautifully recreated by Devlin, that Gucci was born in mind and spirit. The Ascending Room is the first experience of Gucci Cosmos, and it explains through visual, sound, and video the beginnings of Gucci’s history.