"Revenge dress" of Princess Diana to be auctioned for the first time in nearly 30 years

"The revenge dress" worn by the late Princess Diana in 1994 is going under the hammer at Sotheby’s for the first time in nearly three decades. Bloomberg reports, according to UNN.

Details

The black silk evening dress by Greek designer Christina Stambolian is estimated at up to £220,000 ($298,110). It will be sold on December 9 during Sotheby’s Luxury Week in New York, the auction house said Thursday.

Diana wore the dress in June 1994 when she arrived at London’s Serpentine Gallery for a charity evening. It became widely famous because that same evening the then-Prince Charles — from whom Diana had been separated for nearly two years but not yet officially divorced — was widely expected to confess to his marital infidelity in a nationally televised interview.

According to a documentary made later, Diana decided at the last minute to wear this particular dress, initially setting aside a more traditional outfit by Valentino.

She wanted to look like a million dollars.  And she did

Stambolian’s off-the-shoulder dress features an asymmetrical hem and a chiffon train. It will be shown to the public for the first time at Sotheby’s in London during Fashion Week in September, after which it will be exhibited in Hong Kong and Geneva. The dress will then be taken to New York for auction.

According to Sotheby’s, the dress was already sold at auction in 1997, but the auction house did not provide details of that sale.

In 2023, a knee-length black velvet dress that belonged to Diana was sold at Julien’s Auctions in Hollywood for $1,148,080 — 11 times its initial estimate.

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