When “Lupin” came out in 2021, I watched the popular French Netflix series like everyone else.
The premise of the first episode was this: A young man plans an elaborate heist to steal a precious diamond necklace once owned by Marie Antoinette during an auction at the Louvre. The show got rave reviews but I didn’t really get into it at the time.
A robbery at the Louvre? Yeah, right.
Why We Wrote This
The daylight robbery of jewelry from the Louvre has shocked residents and tourists in Paris. But it has stirred up their imaginations as well, as the daring and drama of the theft inspires comparisons to pop culture.
Fast forward to now and here I am in the middle of a true-life mystery thriller. While Parisians were having an overpriced brunch on Sunday, the Louvre Museum was burgled in one of the most audacious robberies in recent history.
At 9:30 in the morning, four people dressed in fluorescent workers’ vests put a ladder up against the side of the most-visited museum in the world, used power tools to force the window open, stole an estimated €88 million ($102 million) worth of jewels from the Apollon Gallery, and bolted out of sight on scooters.
The whole thing was over in seven minutes. It was brazen. Absolutely scandalous. Parisians are eating it up.
“The break-in, the intrigue, … it really feels like we’re in an episode of ‘Lupin,’” says a Parisian named Geneviève S. as she waits for takeout in the central part of the city this week.
“What’s crazy is the speed and ease with which they did this,” says Geneviève’s mother, Delphine C. “This isn’t the first time it’s happened either.”
Indeed, just this week, a Chinese woman was charged over the theft of $1 million worth of gold nuggets from the Natural History Museum in September. In 2010, Tomic Vjeran spectacularly stole five 19th-century paintings from Paris’ Museum of Modern Art. Specialists say art heists are on the rise.
Could it be, wonder some, because the French have been a little too preoccupied with their merry-go-round government as of late? This month, France nominated its seventh prime minister in eight years – who subsequently stepped down and then was reappointed within a matter of days.
Or have the French been so focused on the rising threat of terrorism – admittedly, a serious issue – that they have let the security of their precious artwork slide?
Mind your own business!
On Wednesday, the Louvre’s president, Laurence des Cars, went before the Senate to plead her cause. She said the security protocol had been followed perfectly but asked for a police station to be created inside the museum. She admitted that staff hadn’t done enough to identify the thieves in time.
But many Parisians and tourists alike wonder what they would have done had they seen people scurrying up the side of the Louvre on a truck-mounted moving ladder, something nearly as ubiquitous in Paris as berets and baguettes.
The British transport police motto is “See it. Say it. Sorted,” but the Parisian motto is more like, “See it. Pretend to look at something really important on your cell phone. And for goodness’ sake, mind your own business!”
There are a million stories in Paris of people getting involved in neighborhood drama to their own peril. That’s why Matthieu E., a café owner in the east of Paris, says if he’d seen some guys climbing up the side of the Louvre, he would have poked around for a minute, but then moved on.
“Parisians definitely have the tendency to look the other way and not get involved,” says Matthieu, “even if something fishy is going on.”
Firing up the fantasies
Over at the Louvre, it looks like any other weekday. French schools are on vacation and the esplanade in front of the museum’s famous pyramid is packed with tourists. No one here seems deterred by recent events. In fact, it appears to have incited them to come.
“It’s quite exciting,” says a member of a family visiting from Germany.
“I watched ‘Lupin’ and remember thinking how clever it was, that it could happen in real life,” says another. “Now it sort of has.”
Next to the Apollon Gallery, tourists and locals walk by, snapping goofy selfies in front of the window where the burglary took place. Apart from a bored-looking security guard smoking a cigarette, there is no more police presence now than any other day.
That has some people asking questions.
“Why couldn’t I just rent a van, go to any museum, and see what I can get?” says German tourist Dirk A., as his wife, Viky, laughs hysterically, thinking about the possibility.
Now, questions are swirling over what will happen to the loot. Waiting for her takeout, Geneviève says she wonders if it will be handed over for ransom. On the second-hand clothing app Vinted, young people are already joking that the cheapo necklace they’re selling is made with the stolen royal jewels.
After all, Parisians would be nothing without their mocking sense of humor. A Sunday morning robbery at the most famous museum on the planet? It’s a sad moment for French heritage – but, they say, also a little funny.
“When my 4-year-old takes one step too close to a painting in a museum, an alarm goes off and he’s got five security guards running up to him,” says Youssef B., a journalist based in Paris, shrugging in disbelief outside a neighborhood cafe. “But then these robbers can climb up the side of the Louvre … just like that!”
