THE FATE OF THE PRINCESS’S ICONIC GOWNS REVEALED AFTER GLOBAL SEARCH
INTERVIEW: TRACY SCHAVERIEN Diana: A Life in Dresses is published by ACC Art Books at £40.
ROYAL EXCLUSIVE
D iana, Princess of Wales’s wardrobe was the envy of women all over the world and her trailblazing sense of style inspired copycats everywhere.
Her designer gowns never failed to make a statement, whether she was representing the UK abroad or dressing for a special occasion and, more than 25 years after her death, Diana’s dresses are still making an impact all over the world, as British author Claudia Joseph reveals in a new book, Diana: A Life in Dresses.
Claudia spent months tracking down dozens of gowns that have been auctioned and sold over the past two and a half decades and found many on public display in different corners of the globe.
“I think Diana still inspires a generation of women,” Claudia tells HELLO! as she shares her findings. “We have seen a lot of her clothes reflected on TV in The Crown, which has led to renewed interest in her wardrobe for a new generation. I thought it would be interesting to find out what happened to all those clothes.”
Claudia began her research by sourcing a catalogue from an auction at Christie’s in New York in June 1997 – just two months before Diana’s death – at which the Princess sold 79 of her gowns and raised £1.96m for the Royal Marsden Hospital Cancer Fund and the Aids Crisis Trust.
“I tracked down some of the people who had bought the dresses,” Claudia explains. “I also went through the results of six subsequent auctions in the UK and America and went through every single Diana dress to see if I could find out where they went and how much they had sold for.
“I made a list of people who had bought them and gradually tracked some of them down and built up a picture.”
Some of the dresses were bought by Historic Royal Palaces and are kept here in the UK, either at Hampton Court or Kensington Palace, where gowns including her magnificent wedding dress, designed by Elizabeth and David Emanuel, were displayed in last year’s exhibition Royal Style in the Making. Other dresses are on display in the US, Japan and Ireland, while the Fundación Museo de la Moda fashion museum in Santiago, Chile, has a large collection.
GLOBAL REACH
“I interviewed the museum’s founder, who told me he was going to donate the gowns to Historic Royal Palaces when he died because he feels they ultimately belong to Britain.
“I also found a woman in America who runs a virtual museum and bou
