Horse Play

Hermès celebrates its equestrian heritage by bringing back the horse to Paris at the annual Saut Hermès show jumping competition.

- Karishma Tulsidas

Over a chilly weekend in March, as Paris was awash with ‘yellow vest’ protestors and preparing for the visit of Chinese premier Xi Jinping, another momentous event had taken over Grand Palais and the city itself: Saut Hermès, an annual show jumping competition that sees the best in class compete for top prize. Organised by French maison Hermès, the competition takes place in the historic building of Grand Palais, which formerly hosted equestrian shows until 1957. It was only in 2010 that horses were brought back to the building, thanks to Hermès.

Director of the equestrian metier at Hermès, Marion Larochette, explains: “The key idea of this event was to reintroduce the horse inside Paris and inside this historical monument. It had been built first for the Exposition Universelle (Universal Exhibition) of 1900, but also built to host equestrian horse shows. The basement of Grand Palais had barns that we cannot use anymore because of security reasons (the basement now houses a huge police station to protect the artworks exhibited at Grand Palais). From 1901 to 1957, there were frequent horse shows where Hermès was present with its saddle stores. Grand Palais is actually a metaphor of what happened to the horse because Hermès was born in 1837 as a harness maker and then saddle maker, and for almost a century, the horse was the only client of Hermès. Progressively, cars replaced horses in the streets of Paris, and in Grand Palais, horse shows stopped in 1957 and were replaced by car exhibitions. The idea was to give back Grand Palais to the horse and also reintroduce the horse inside Paris.”