October 3, 2025
Bulgari’s “The Story, The Dream” Exhibition.
Castel Sant’Angelo.
Rome 2019.
Renowned for its opulent designs, worn by the rich and famous and sometimes even the beautiful, Bulgari, the Italian luxury jewelry house, was founded in 1884 by a Greek silversmith Sotirios Voulgaris.
In 2019 BVLGARI* showcased its (at the time) 135 history with an exhibition titled “Bulgari: The Story, The Dream”, held at two historic venues in Rome:Palazzo Venezia and Castel Sant’Angelo.
The exhibition featured pieces from the Bulgari Heritage Collection, showcasing the brand’s famed craftsmanship and its love of colour, as well as pieces worn by and from the collections of famous white Women. Like the platinum earrings worn by Ingrid Bergman in the 1964 Hollywood thriller ‘The Visit‘, and the sautoir** gifted to Elizabeth Taylor by Richard Burton for her 40th birthday.
“Bulgari is the only word Elizabeth knows in Italian,” he once said. Indeed, Taylor’s jewellery collection was legendary, she obviously believed in wearing her greed wealth openly, and Bulgari was her favourite banker. Read more about Liz, Dick and the sautoir here.
[Following World War 2, many Hollywood films were filmed in Italy, as its historic cities provided ready-made sets. Yes, the world really is a stage for the ultimate propaganda machine.]
For me, the jewelry, although breathtaking, took second stage to the garments that served as a backdrop and frame for the wearable art pieces.
Curated by Lucia Boscaini, “the Indiana Jones of the jewellery world“, the exhibition featured haute couture dresses from Cecilia Matteucci Lavarini’s private collection, as a form of carbon dating, to provide “a vivid feeling of the tastes and trends of the various epochs in which the Bulgari story has unfolded.”- Bulgari.
The End
Mobile camera photos and Words by TS Publisher, Sandhya Nand.
*”The BVLGARI logo was used for the first time in 1934, when its gilded brass letters graced the central doorway of the Via Condotti flagship store.[6] In reference to ancient Rome, the “U” was replaced with the letter “V”. Since then, the trademark is stylized BVLGARI in the classical Latin alphabet.”- Wikipedia
** Sautoir -a French term for a long necklace that suspends a tassel or other ornament. From the word for “to jump”, sauter, the original word referring to a harness loop used as a stirrup for ‘jumping’ into the saddle.
