Carrie Vik estimates that she has traveled
to more than 1,000 hotels in her lifetime.
And while lobbies are often sprawling spaces adorned
with antiques and art, guest rooms are significantly
more bland. “You don’t even remember the difference
between one room and the other,” says Vik, co-owner
of Vik Retreats. An alternative: the 89 site-specific
installations located within Galleria Vik Milano.
At the just-opened property, a town house in Milan’s
iconic glass-domed shopping arcade, Galleria Vittorio
Emanuele II, Vik and her
husband, Alexander, played both
proprietor and curator—in one
room guests sleep surrounded
by cloud photographs by Julian
Lennon; in another, gold
leaf by Italian artist Elena Trailina adorns the walls
and furniture. Downstairs, guests are greeted by
Rodin’s Thinker, who sits contemplatively by the
reception desk. “We wanted to push the envelope of
design,” Vik says.
Galleria Vik Milano is just one example of the
migration of fine art from the gallery to the guesthouse.
“Hotels are using their public spaces like museums,”
says Albert M. Herrera, head of Global Product
Partnerships at travel concierge company Virtuoso,
“featuring works of art in a more pronounced way.”
Take the recently opened Fife Arms in the Scottish
Highlands. Owned by Iwan and Manuela Wirth
(of Hauser & Wirth), the Victorian Inn showcases a
Picasso over the tea table, a Dutch Master in the
dining room, a Man Ray portrait of Elsa Schiaparelli
in the bar. On this side of the pond, the Louisville-
based 21c Museum Hotels positions each of its
establishments as a contemporary art museum you
can sleep in—some 75,000 square feet of exhibition
space is spread across their eight locations. A night
at the museum is no longer a fantasy.—elise tay lor
TRAVEL
Art in Residence
BEHIND THE LOOK
Stealing the Show
When Monsieur Dior put on his
first London fashion show in 1950,
the British press headlined it dior
“circus” comes to town. With a
wink, current Dior artistic director
Maria Grazia Chiuri recently
played ringmaster to a circus of
her own to showcase a couture
collection, heady with harlequin
prints, inside a Ringling Bros.
and Barnum & Bailey–esque
tent replete with acrobats. The
look that actress Lucy Boynton
chose to wear, according to
Chiuri, is “the result of a sleight
of hand that has made it
possible to create pleats that turn
into swirls.” It’s high-wire-act
trickery that’s most definitely a
crowd-pleaser.—LILAH RAMZI
DIAMONDS ARE
FOREVER
CHIURI’S HARLEQUIN PRINT
RECALLS A VERSION BY JOHN
GALLIANO (RIGHT) SHOWN
AT DIOR’S SPRING 1998
COUTURE COLLECTION.
MOD MOOD
NODDING TO THE ’60s, BOYNTON
(TOP LEFT) RIMMED HER EYES
WITH KOHL, PAINTING FAUX
LASHES WITH DELICATE TICKS
OF EYELINER, MUCH LIKE THIS
1964 VOGUE COVER (ABOVE).
STEP
RIGHT UP
THE SHOW’S SET
DESIGN (BELOW)
BROUGHT THE
CIRCUS THEME
TO LIFE.
COLOR WASH
A SHOWER (TOP)
AT GALLERIA VIK
MILANO FEATURES
FERNANDO LOPEZ
LAGE’S BOLD WORKS.
VLIFE
108 DECEMBER 2019 VOGUE.COM
BOYNTON: JOHN LAMPARSKI/GETTY IMAGES. COVER: IRVING PENN,
VOGUE
, 1964. RUNWAY: GUY MARINEAU. TENT:
© ADRIEN DIRAND/COURTESY CHRISTIAN DIOR. TRAVEL: PHOTO BY SIMONE FURIOSI, COURTESY OF VIK RETREATS.
