Somehow Gaggan at Louis Vuitton Bangkok tastes like you imagine Louis Vuitton would: delicate, sweet and sassy. Maybe it’s the Louis Vuitton monograms you lick off the plate or that appear in a tuile over the dessert. “Trying to do less of those, mate,” Head Chef Vix Rathour interrupts in a strong east London accent, reminding you this is most like the iconoclastic Marc Jacobs-era Louis Vuitton made edible.
Downstairs, the immersive ‘Louis Vuitton Visionary Journeys’ exhibition (you can book a visit online) welcomes visitors through a guard of honor ‘Trunkscape’ featuring 96 Louis Vuitton trunks assembled as a tunnel. Then there’s an archive of objects and artifacts showing how Louis Vuitton’s formative years led to him making those trunks in the early 19th century, and beyond that, five iconic bag models – Alma, Keepall, Speedy, Noé and Petite Malle – each shown through 25 years of reinterpretation by Marc Jacobs, Kim Jones, Nicolas Ghesquière, Virgil Abloh and Pharrell Williams.
Then the ‘Collaborations’ room follows: a semi-circular space lined with 184 chrome-dipped bags, documenting partnerships with Stephen Sprouse, Richard Prince, Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama.
It’s that Marc Jacobs era, circa 2001, when the designer took the sacred monogram – the thing Louis Vuitton had spent a century protecting through patents and lawsuits – and let a New York street artist, Stephen Sprouse, spray neon graffiti all over it. The bags looked vandalized. And that was the point. Some observers saw it as sacrilege. Others saw it as Louis Vuitton finally acknowledging it lived in the 21st century. Naturally, the collection sold out immediately.
That moment opened the door for everything that followed: Murakami’s multicolor chaos, Richard Prince’s nurse prints, Kusama’s polka dots and Virgil Abloh’s entire tenure. But Stephen Sprouse was first. With Marc Jacobs he proved that luxury brands could be irreverent with their own heritage and survive – and maybe even thrive.
Upstairs, at Gaggan At Louis Vuitton, that same spirit lives on.
Breaking The Ice At Gaggan At Louis Vuitton
“This is Louis Vuitton as interpreted through the lens of Gaggan’s cuisine,” Jake Leard, restaurant manager and sommelier, announces to kick off proceedings. That means the punky, performative passion that defined Gaggan Anand’s Bangkok flagship where he offered emoji-only menus and heavy metal playlists, while picking up four consecutive Asia’s 50 Best Restaurant awards (he picked the title up again last year after a considerable hiatus). All channeled into French technique and luxury ingredients.
The team immediately gets to work. “Hold out your hand,” Fanta demands, helping drop a yogurt sphere into a biscuit with its four-petal floral motif that appears throughout Louis Vuitton designs. The sphere breaks seductively and pop rocks crackle on the tongue.
When Louis Vuitton opened his shop in 1854, he hung a sign outside: “Securely packs the most fragile objects.” He was 33, had just left his master’s workshop, and was setting up his own trunk-making business in Paris. They’ve done the same thing with the yogurt sphere. It’s fragile, but it holds something even more delicate inside.
Then you’re licking a plate with an autumnal chestnut motif and those monograms, off the ceramic. “It is deliberate that,” Vix nods at the plates. “At Gaggan and at Gaggan at Louis Vuitton we do it because it kind of breaks the ice.”
It is a giddy thrill – the initial apprehension, glancing around the table self-consciously, then launching into it, getting some of the powder topping on your nose and by that point not caring one bit. “Everyone always just starts giggling and laughing,” he says, observing the table doing the same.
A Trip Around The World
Today, Louis Vuitton has over 460 stores in 50 countries. Gaggan’s reach is ever-expanding too. After Bangkok, he opened Ms. Maria & Mr. Singh in Singapore, GohGan in Fukuoka, and this restaurant, Gaggan at Louis Vuitton, in 2024. In January, he announced he’s finally opening in India, with Rydo, after 10 years of waiting.
Chef Vix arrives at the table offering a dish on the same globetrotting theme. “We’re gonna open your world up for you…and take you on a trip around the world,” he announces, the restaurant uniform hanging off him like he borrowed it from someone much bigger than him. “People keep thinking it’s Gaggan’s jacket but I just lost a lot of weight,” he explains.
The first course comes in a globe-shaped vessel that opens into three dishes: three bites representing three countries. There’s a jammy dodger biscuit – the crunchy British childhood staple – with whipped goat’s cheese instead of its sugary fondant center and a beetroot and beer jam in place of its sweet heart-shaped strawberry filling, and a dollop of caviar on top to temper the sweetness with some saltiness and brine. It’s swaddled in a newspaper, like fish and chips wrapping.
“No one reads newspapers anymore,” Vix complains, handing over another copy that hasn’t been scrunched beneath the biscuit. “But that’s got a few really cool stories on there,” he adds, with the pride of a first-time author (he and Jake made it, based on the characters in the kitchen). There’s one about viscous eels in the river Thames, one about a police box that alludes to Dr. Who, and another about fish and chips itself.
“Enjoy that in one bite,” Vix suggests slightly antagonistically.
Then there’s Bangkok. A young scallop, lightly cured, with avocado, topped with a veil made from fish sauce and vinegar. There’s tartare underneath. And a rice cracker base. “Have that in two bites,” he instructs again.
Finally, Australia. This time a small pavlova with almonds, black pepper, whipped stracciatella, and blueberry barbecue jam. “UK, Thailand, Australia,” Vix announces triumphantly before returning to the kitchen.
A Winter’s Menu
This is Louis Vuitton by Gaggan’s ‘A Winter’s Menu,’ inspired by Charles Dickens.
When Dickens published ‘A Christmas Carol’ in 1843, Louis Vuitton was still a young apprentice under Monsieur Maréchal, learning to make those trunks (he wouldn’t open his own shop for another 11 years).
“Love a bit of Dickens,” Vix nods, “even the Muppet’s version of ‘A Christmas Carol’ is really good.”
The next course heads to the subcontinent. Four bites, each pulling from a different corner of India — a Belgian waffle with Bombay chili cheese; a butter chicken skewer Vix cheerfully calls ‘Delhi-belly’; a Rajasthan cracker with macadamia, milk ice cream and cardamom foam; and the menu’s ‘Portrait of the Himalayas’: momo dumplings with local mushroom and ginger, smoked cream oil, the heat building quietly across all four plates.
Purple Reigns arrives next: Norwegian trout marinated and served with watermelon radish and beetroot in a tartlet, everything on the plate skewing purple, the name doing exactly what it says while also casually referencing Prince.
A Tale of Two Lobsters
Then there’s lobster. Two courses, one crustacean with completely different approaches. Part I: features a lobster tail with kidney bean purée made with orange, and Japanese rice cooked in a wrap with plating that looks volcanic. Part II follows with the claw and knuckle on Indian rice over preserved summer tomato veil, topped with kombu dressed in sauce vierge.
Jake’s wine selections lean towards natural, contemporary and the unexpected. His first pour: Loire Sauvignon from Maincardlines vineyard, 2020, that’s nutty, well-rounded, and elegant.
Later, there’s a “very contemporary” German Riesling from Jacob Tennstedt. “Bangkok’s breaking free from very traditional European pairings and the French fine dining approach,” Jake explains. “And it’s really finding its own merit to do things with a little more character when it comes to wine.”
He could be talking about Vix. Or the restaurant itself. Or the entire concept of Louis Vuitton letting Gaggan loose inside its temple to commerce.
Shades of Orange
Dessert arrives as Shades of Orange – a citrus-forward and seasonal offering – then Coffee and Doughnut to close, which is a sweet potato donut with coffee and maple syrup, dark chocolate inside with Thai chili and cashew nuts, cookie dough ice cream on the side.
Jake, trying to keep up with all the rebellion, pours a pet nat from the Jousset family in the Loire Valley – white fruit, and floral – and it works with the sweetness without fighting it.
“It’s about taking something that’s very iconic and revered and defacing it and creating something new, somewhat rebellious, and kind of punk,” Vix might have concluded. Only that was Marc Jacobs reflecting on his graffiti idea back in 2001.
It could easily describe what’s happening upstairs at Louis Vuitton by Gaggan – jammy dodgers with caviar, butter chicken skewers with German Riesling, and momos served in a luxury retail space.
Louis Vuitton spent a century protecting its heritage. Then it learned something: the best way to preserve a legacy is to let someone deface it. Gaggan, Vix and Jake are doing exactly that – one giggling, licked-clean plate at a time.
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