The icon wore the Dior gown to the 1961 Academy Awards
One of Elizabeth Taylor's most famous dresses is going to auction: the gown that she wore to win her first Oscar. Casual Cotton-Padded Clothes
The movie star wore a floral Christian Dior couture gown to the 33rd Academy Awards in 1961, where she won the Oscar for Best Actress, for her performance in Battlefield 8 – in which she played the part of a Manhattan call girl who has an affair with a rich married man. It was widely reported that Taylor saw her Dior gown as a good luck charm from then on and would regularly revisit similar styles.
Many believed that the historic dress had been been returned to the Dior archives, but last year it was rediscovered in a suitcase in London along with a selection of other garments also previously owned by Taylor. It is now joining the listings in an upcoming auction, with a pre-sale estimate of £60,000 to £100,000.
Marc Bohan designed the Siorée à Rio ‘Oscar’ dress for Dior's spring/summer 1961 collection. The striking creation featured a yellow bodice, a green taffeta belt with a red rose and a silk bubble skirt covered in embroidered flowers. This particular dress was one of Bohan’s earliest works for Dior in his role as creative director, having replaced Yves Saint Laurent in 1960.
Taylor famously used to travel with 40 huge trunks of clothes, but eventually decided to give away her special Dior gown – alongside many other pieces – gifting the 'lucky' dress to close family friends Gaston and Elizabeth Sanz. Gaston Sanz had worked for Elizabeth Taylor since the 1950s and was one of her most trusted and longest-serving employees.
In 2022, the Sanz family contacted Kerry Taylor Auctions to assess the value of Anne Sanz's collection of Taylor's clothes, kept in excellent condition in suitcases located in London. Other garments that will be sold alongside the gown include a Tiziani by Karl Lagerfeld couture cocktail dress, a Christian Dior couture by Marc Bohan blue silk crêpe piece, and her film-worn robe from Boom! designed by Karl Lagerfeld.
The collection will be auctioned on 12 December as part of Kerry Taylor Auction's Passion for Fashion Sale.
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