A view of the 'Hugo the decorator' exhibition at the Maison de Victor Hugo in Paris. GAUTIER DEBLONDE
While Victor Hugo (1802-1885) is remembered chiefly as a poet, writer and committed political figure, he is less often seen as an interior architect and designer. A new exhibition, "Hugo the decorator," at the Maison de Victor Hugo, on view through April 26, 2026, in Paris, explores this lesser-known side of the celebrated author.
Gérard Audinet, the exhibition's curator and director of the Maisons de Victor Hugo in Paris and in Guernsey, faced a significant challenge: Much of Hugo's furniture was dispersed when he fled to the island of Jersey in 1852 after opposing the coup d'état by Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte in 1851. And because parts of Hugo's interiors no longer exist or cannot be moved (such as those in his Guernsey residence, where he lived in exile from 1855 to 1870), the exhibition, enhanced by photographs, drawings and films, admirably conveys the wild, almost baroque creativity of the poet as decorator.
The exhibition begins on the first floor of the Parisian museum with a symbolic and rarely displayed, fragile object: a miniature dollhouse made in 1832-1833 for Hugo's three eldest children, crafted from folded and cut playing cards. Three refined interiors are visible: a kitchen, a library and a billiard room, reflecting his distinctive eye for interior architecture and everyday objects.
