LACRIMA at the Barbican: The Hidden Seams of Couture
A wedding dress is often celebrated for its grandeur — the silk, the lace, the shimmer that dazzles for a few fleeting minutes. Yet rarely do we see the hidden stitches, the anonymous labour, or the private lives poured into its making. In LACRIMA, French director and playwright Caroline Guiela Nguyen pulls that hidden world into view. Showing at the Barbican from 25–27 September 2025, this ambitious, multilingual production asks audiences to look not at the gown itself, but at the hands that made it.
Scene from LACRIMA. Photo Credit: Jean Louis Fernandez.
Nguyen, founder of the company Les Hommes Approximatifs and Artistic Director of Théâtre National de Strasbourg, has long worked to spotlight hidden lives. Her acclaimed productions draw audiences into overlooked histories and communities. With LACRIMA, she begins with the secrecy surrounding Princess Diana’s dress — a premise at once fairy tale and reality. On the eve of her wedding, the Princess of England commissions her dress from a prestigious Parisian couture house. On stage, the Paris studio is mirrored through split-screen projection with an Alençon lace workshop and the embroidery ateliers of Mumbai...
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Image Credits:
Lead: Scene from LACRIMA. Photo Credit: Jean Louis Fernandez.
All other images as credited in photo captions.