US museum bags Di dresses after reading Mail
WHEN couturier Jacques Azagury decided to auction his collection of Princess Diana memorabilia, including ‘twin’ versions of some of her most iconic gowns, he expected the auction house to be packed with frantic bidders.
But just 24 hours after the Mail revealed that the designer was selling the dresses – along with cards and letters from the princess, patterns of the gowns, and a toile – he was offered a snap sale.
Collector Renae Plant, who runs a 3D interactive online museum of Diana’s outfits, is estimated to have paid £ 100,000 for the collection after reading about the auction, at Lay’s Auctioneers, in Penzance, Cornwall, in Tuesday’s Mail.
The dresses are now heading for Los Angeles, where they will be preserved by The Princess & The Platypus Foundation and displayed in the Princess Diana Museum. Last night Ms Plant said: ‘I saw the story on Dailymail.com and . . . I then reached out to Jacques because I worked with him in the past and I was thrilled when he accepted my bid. I’m delighted that the whole collection is going to one museum as a complete story.’
Azagury designed 18 outfits for Diana, but it was the last few that he nicknamed the ‘Famous Five’. They were made after her separation from Prince Charles when she could be more daring.
Azagury made a ‘twin’ of each gown, using the same measurements, at the same time. Now, after retiring and closing his eponymous shop in Knightsbridge, they are being sold.
The Famous Five include a red silk column dress, an ice blue silk georgette number, hand beaded with crystal bugle beads, and a black Chantilly lace column, embroidered with sequins and beads.