Lalique Museum loses $5 million in jewelry as French heists mount

Masked thieves stole 27 pieces of Art Nouveau jewelry worth about $5 million from the Musée Lalique in northeastern France on Sunday, the latest in a string of high-profile museum thefts that have exposed gaps in the country's cultural security.

Three burglars forced open an emergency exit at the museum in Wingen-sur-Moder, a village of 1,500 people about 37 miles northwest of Strasbourg, around 5:30 a.m. local time, according to police and museum officials. Once inside, they used sledgehammers to smash six reinforced display cases in the jewelry gallery and made off with the haul in 11 minutes, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing the museum.

"All the alarms went off, just as they should. And then with the security company, apparently, there was a major failure on their part: they didn't intervene right away, they didn't inform the gendarmes," Christian Dorschner, mayor of Wingen-sur-Moder, told local newspaper Les Dernieres Nouvelles d'Alsace. "They were surely well informed to carry out this job in that way; they must be specialists."

The stolen inventory includes the museum's centerpiece, "Dragonfly Woman with Open Wings," a masterpiece of gold, diamonds and enamel that was the first piece acquired specifically for the museum's creation, according to a museum spokesperson. Also taken were a bust, brooches, a perfume bottle, two bracelets, a comb, a hatpin, a belt buckle and several necklaces and pendants. Because the jewelry is crafted from crystal, enamel, horn, ivory and semi-precious stones rather than raw precious metals, the pieces cannot be easily melted down or dismantled for resale, a source close to the investigation told AFP.

The heist is the latest blow to French museum security following a $102 million daytime robbery at the Louvre in Paris in October 2025, in which thieves stole eight pieces of the French crown jewels in less than eight minutes. None of those items have been recovered, though several suspects have been arrested and charged. A subsequent security audit found that 35% of the rooms in the Louvre's Denon Wing, where the stolen jewels were displayed, were not monitored by security cameras, according to Radio France. Louvre director Laurence des Cars stepped down following criticism over the theft and security staffing issues.

French museums have suffered a spate of break-ins over the past year. In November 2024, four men with axes and baseball bats smashed display cases at the Cognacq-Jay museum in Paris, stealing 18th-century works that resulted in an insurance payout of over $4 million. The following day, jewelry valued at several million dollars was stolen during an armed robbery at a museum in Saone-et-Loire. In September 2024, thieves snatched three porcelain works classed as national treasures from the Adrien Dubouche National Museum in Limoges.

The Musée Lalique, which opened in 2011 on the site of a former glassworks factory, houses more than 650 works by René Lalique, the Art Nouveau and Art Deco jeweler and glassmaker who lived from 1860 to 1945. Lalique opened his glassmaking factory in Wingen-sur-Moder in 1921, and his pieces have sold for nearly $1 million at auction, including a "Wasp" pendant necklace from around 1900 that fetched $970,000. The museum said it has provided details of each stolen piece to police but has not yet released a full public list, which could complicate efforts to track the items on the secondary market.

The museum announced on its website that it will remain closed for several days following the burglary. CCTV footage is being examined as part of the investigation, which remains ongoing.

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