A King's Carpet: Louis XIV and the Savonnerie

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 5th Ave, 10028, New York City

September 8, 2026 – March 5, 2028

In 1668, Louis XIV commissioned the Savonnerie manufactory in Paris to produce an enormous carpet for the Louvre’s Grande Galerie, an ambitious project that became one of the most extraordinary undertakings in art and textile history. The Met’s exhibition, the first in the United States devoted to Savonnerie, focuses on three carpets from this royal scheme and traces their creation, labor-intensive production, and later dispersal after the French Revolution. Woven over two decades by large workshops that relied on young workers with sharp eyesight and nimble hands, the carpets were never installed as originally planned, since Louis XIV shifted his attention to Versailles. After the Revolution, many were altered, sold, or broken up, with some eventually entering major American collections. The exhibition brings together complete carpets and fragments, while also featuring a live conservation studio where visitors can watch one of these monumental textiles being repaired.