Dior Turns Historic Médaillon Chairs Into Surreal Towers For its Fall Boutique Windows
Dior is bringing a new retail story to stores around the world through window installations that transform one of the Maison’s most recognisable design codes into a surreal visual experience. Created to accompany the Fall Winter 2026-2027 collection by Jonathan Anderson, the displays use stacked Médaillon chairs, miniature details and references to 18th-century Paris to create a world that feels poetic, playful and unmistakably Dior.
The new concept takes classical Parisian architecture as its starting point. Decorative mouldings, ornate proportions and echoes of 18th-century interiors provide a refined foundation, but the familiar elements are shifted through a more unexpected and imaginative lens. The result is not a literal re-creation of the past. Instead, it is a contemporary interpretation of heritage, where scale, balance and function are deliberately disrupted.
At the centre of the installations are the Médaillon chairs. These oval backed chairs are deeply connected to the history of Dior,…
having furnished Christian Dior’s first boutique, Colifichets, which opened at 30 Avenue Montaigne in Paris in 1947. Their graceful outline and neoclassical character have since become an enduring part of the Maison’s visual language. For the new windows, the chairs are no longer simply pieces of furniture.
They become characters within the scenography. Stacked in delicate arrangements, they rise into precarious towers, lean into one another like houses of cards or appear in unexpected oversized forms.
Their placement creates a feeling of movement and instability, inviting customers to look more closely at the balance between structure and play. This approach gives the installations a sense of surrealism.
Objects that would usually be associated with comfort, hospitality or a formal salon are transformed into sculptural elements that challenge expectations. The chair is still recognisable, but its usual purpose has been altered. It becomes architecture, display furniture and art object at the same time…
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