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“Some dresses were never destined for auctions or museums,” her former royal butler said.
The Gist
- Princess Diana’s wardrobe was iconic—and, according to her former royal butler Paul Burrell, she sold some of her pieces to thrift shops.
- The reason she did so is surprising and has ties to her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry.
- “Some dresses were never destined for auctions or museums,” Burrell wrote in his book A Royal Duty.
Long before Princess Diana’s famous Christie’s auction in June 1997—just two months before her untimely death—the former Princess of Wales was selling her old clothing differently.
That’s according to Diana’s former royal butler Paul Burrell, who wrote in his book A Royal Duty that, when it came to the princess’s iconic wardrobe, “Some dresses were never destined for auctions or museums.”
Instead, Burrell wrote (per Marie Claire), some of Diana’s designer clothes were taken to thrift stores in Knightsbridge or Chelsea “where they would be handed over in exchange for cash when sold.”
It was Diana’s decision to sell some items of clothing in order “to raise spending money for her, because royals rarely carry hard currency,” Burrell added.
“By generating cash, she could spend it as she wished without trace, and take [her sons Prince] William and [Prince] Harry to the cinema or to McDonald’s,” he continued.
Burrell said of William and Harry, “In the biggest paradox of their opulent royal life, the young princes were fascinated by money and how the Queen [Elizabeth]’s face adorned every note of every denomination.”
“A £10 note was a ‘brown Granny’ and a £50 note was a ‘pink Granny,’” Burrell wrote, nodding to William and Harry’s nickname for their grandmother, the queen. “When the princess handed out money, it was a joy to watch the boys jumping up and down, clutching the notes, invariably a ‘pink Granny.’”
As to the aforementioned Christie’s auction in June 1997—an idea from William to sell Diana’s clothes to raise money for charity—The New York Times reported that the event brought in $3.25 million for 79 cocktail and evening dresses. This averaged more than $41,000 per dress, well above Christie’s estimated $5,000 value for each dress.
The auction benefited cancer and AIDS charities and was attended by more than 1,100 people, no one, of course, knowing that by the end of the summer, the event would be even more poignant after Diana died in a Paris car crash at just 36 years old on August 31.
Lord Hindlip, the auctioneer and chairman of Christie’s International, said Christie’s took in about twice what he had expected, per The New York Times. Christie’s International’s creative director, Meredith Etherington-Smith, visited Diana’s home at Kensington Palace to look at Diana’s dresses, and was taken aback by “quite a large room” jammed with clothes.
“The princess said, ‘You can see my problem,’” Etherington-Smith said at the time. “I said, ‘I certainly can.’”
During the auction in New York City in June 1997, Diana remained in London, but asked that Christie’s send her the results overnight. “She wants a fax so that her butler can bring it with the breakfast tray,” Etherington-Smith said.
Items from Diana’s closet still go up for auction today, nearly 30 years after her death. Last summer, one of the largest auctions of Diana’s belongings took place in Los Angeles, where 300 items hit the auction block.
“I don’t know if it’s wrong to say this, but in some people’s minds, she’s like a saint,” said Elizabeth Emanuel, who designed Diana’s 1981 wedding dress with her then-husband David. Speaking to People, Elizabeth said, “They want to touch her, they want anything that was part of her. She was such a beautiful person, such a radiant soul—they don’t want to let her go.”
“I can’t think of anybody else that this would apply to, who was like her and remembered by so many people,” she added.
One item that will never go up for auction or for sale? Diana’s winter coats. That’s according to Martin Nolan, cofounder and executive director of Julien’s Auctions, which put on 2025’s “Princess Diana’s Style & A Royal Collection” auction.
“We learned through this how generous Diana was, always giving items,” he told People. “And you never see a coat from Diana come to auction, because she used to get her butler or her staff or friends to drive around London, [in] January, February, [in the] freezing cold.”
“She’d find homeless people, and she would give her coats away,” Nolan said. “That’s how she was—without any spectacle or whatever.”
Read the original article on InStyle
