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Sotheby’s announced this week that Princess Diana’s black silk off-the-shoulder dress, known as the revenge dress, will headline a dedicated fashion sale in New York on Dec. 9 as part of the auction house’s Luxury Week. The house estimates the garment will fetch between $150,000 and $300,000, according to its official release, with Diana’s lasting global appeal potentially driving the price higher. A New York Times assessment found that a similar Diana evening gown sold in 2023 for $1.15 million, more than 11 times its expected value and a record for any of her dresses.
The dress was worn by Diana on June 29, 1994, to a Serpentine Gallery fundraiser in London, the same night a national television broadcast featured then-Prince Charles admitting to adultery during their marriage. Designed by Greek couturier Christina Stambolian in 1991, the item had stayed unworn in her closet for three years before she chose it at the last minute over another planned outfit, Sotheby’s said in its statement. She completed the look with a pearl and sapphire choker, a Salvatore Ferragamo clutch and Manolo Blahnik heels.
Media coverage quickly dubbed the figure-hugging mini dress the revenge dress, a label that has since defined a broader fashion concept of dressing assertively after personal setbacks. The Guardian reported that the garment has its own Wikipedia entry and helped establish revenge dressing as a recognized cultural category. Sotheby’s global head of handbags and fashion Morgane Halimi stated that the dress occupies a unique place in fashion history because it represents one of those very rare moments when a garment transcends fashion to become part of cultural history.
Diana consigned the dress to a 1997 Christie’s charity auction along with 78 other gowns to benefit AIDS and cancer causes, where it sold for roughly $65,000 at the time. The buyers from that sale, who have remained unnamed, are now offering it again with a portion of proceeds supporting NHS Lothian Charity on behalf of the Royal Edinburgh Hospital, according to Vogue coverage of the announcement. A numbered and signed copy of the original 1997 auction catalogue, which credits Prince William with suggesting the earlier sale, will be included with the lot.
The dress will go on public display at Sotheby’s London from Sept. 18 to 24 during London Fashion Week before traveling to Hong Kong in October, Geneva in November and New York ahead of the sale, The Washington Post reported. Such exhibitions have become standard for high-profile royal items to build interest among potential bidders and the public. Bloomberg noted that the current owners approached Sotheby’s to bring the dress back to market at a time when demand for Diana-related artifacts continues to rise.
The upcoming auction follows the June sale of the Jaguar XJ40 car Diana drove to the 1994 Serpentine event, which fetched a record £66,250 according to USA Today. That result exceeded the vehicle’s estimated value by more than 16 times and set a new global benchmark for the model. Together the sales illustrate the robust secondary market for objects tied to the princess, whose fashion choices remain widely referenced by designers and in productions such as The Crown.
