Vu Lilien a Linnen: Art Nouveau in Luxembourg — Nationalmusée, Luxembourg City

Between 1893 and the early 1900s, a small country caught between France, Germany and Belgium built its own version of Art Nouveau — and largely kept it to itself. From 20 March to 18 October 2026 the Nationalmusée um Fëschmaart in Luxembourg City shows Vu Lilien a Linnen (“From lilies to linen”), the first exhibition to look in depth at Jugendstil, craft and art in the Grand Duchy.

The show draws mainly on applied art — furniture, metalwork, textiles, glass — alongside preparatory drawings and historical photographs never shown before. It traces how Luxembourg’s own artistic association, founded in 1893, and the State School of Craftsmen, opened in 1896 to train artists and craftsmen side by side, tried to hold on to local tradition while staying open to what was happening next door: the same wave that produced Nancy’s École de Nancy, Brussels’ Art Nouveau townhouses and the Jugendstil workshops of the Rhineland.

It is a modest, largely unpublished chapter of the style’s story — Luxembourg had neither the wealth of Nancy nor the architectural ambition of Brussels, but the objects on show, many surfacing from private and institutional collections for this occasion, argue that the Grand Duchy took the same idea seriously: that everyday objects, made well, could carry the modernity of their time.

Practical details

• When: 20 March to 18 October 2026
• Where: Nationalmusée um Fëschmaart, Marché-aux-Poissons, L-2345 Luxembourg City, Luxembourg
• Opening hours: Tuesday to Sunday 10am to 6pm, Thursday until 8pm; closed Mondays
• Organised by: Nationalmusée um Fëschmaart (National Museum of Archaeology, History and Art)

Cultural Heritage Online lists this exhibition for readers travelling in Luxembourg this autumn.