Living well is the best revenge, or so the saying goes.
For Princess Diana, revenge took the form of a form-fitting, off-the-shoulder silk dress that made history when she wore it 30 years ago.
On the night Prince Charles admitted his affair with Camilla, Diana donned designer Christina Stambolian’s little black dress to send her own message.
After Charles revealed his sin to presenter Jonathan Dimbleby in a television interview, Diana wore the Revenge dress, as it was quickly dubbed, to a glitzy fundraising dinner at the Serpentine Gallery.
Charles’ conversation was highly newsworthy. When asked if he had been “faithful and honorable”, the future King said “yes”, before adding: “Until (the marriage) broke down irretrievably, we both tried.”
But it was Diana’s “answer” in the form of her choice of dress – in a color royals reserved for mourning – that made even more of an impact.
Royal writer Tina Brown even described it in her 2007 book The Diana Chronicles as her ‘fucking dress’, and newspapers of the time agreed.
The Mail reported: “Charles bragging while Diana dazzles.”
Princess Diana wore the iconic black number now known as the Revenge Dress, designed by Christina Stambolian, on June 29, 1994, at the Serpentine Gallery.
At the time, her ex-husband, Charles, was being broadcast on television across the country being interviewed about his infidelity with Camilla Parker-Bowles.
Diana only wore the Stambolian dress that night because rival designer Valentino had leaked that the princess would be wearing one of his designs.
So, by making a last-minute change, a dress that had been sitting in her wardrobe collecting dust for three years became one of the most famous in history.
She had bought the dress for £900 from Stambolian’s store after having lunch with her brother Charles Spencer at his favourite restaurant, the now-closed San Lorenzo, before strolling down Beauchamp Place in Knightsbridge and entering Stambolian’s store.
Christina Stambolian recalled that Princess Diana ordered a “special dress for a special occasion” at her store in 1991, according to Claudia Joseph’s book, Diana: A Life in Dresses.
Stambolian previously recalled how Diana was initially unsure about the revealing design and wanted it in cream rather than black.
She said: “We sat down and I drew some sketches on a piece of paper.”
‘The dress was revealing, quite short and showed a lot of legs and skin. Diana wasn’t sure about that. She thought it was a bit forward. She wanted everything to be more covered, longer and with a higher neck.
“I told her she had nice legs and she should show them off. ‘Why not dare?’ I said. She asked her brother (Charles) and he said, ‘Do what you think is right.’ Eventually she said ‘yes’ to the style and then we moved on to the color.
‘I had black in my mind, but she wanted cream. To me, Diana was a black and white person. I didn’t like it with the pale pinks and blues with lots of beads.
It took two seamstresses more than 60 hours to create the costume.
Stambolian said she was “delighted to see Diana wear it that night of all nights.”
Princess Diana’s revenge dress sketch by Christina Stambolian taken from the book Diana: A Life in Dresses by Claudia Joseph.
The Revenge Dress features an asymmetrical hem, with a flattering sheer train that hangs from the cinched waist.
Referring to Swan Lake, one of Princess Diana’s favorite works, Stambolian added: “She chose not to play the scene as Odette, innocent in white. She was clearly angry.
‘She did it like Odile in black. She was wearing bright red nail polish, something we had never seen on her before. She was like, “Let’s be evil tonight.”
The dress featured an asymmetrical hem, with a flattering sheer train that hung from the cinched waist.
Featuring a flirty sweetheart neckline, Diana turned heads by pairing the dress with sheer tights, stiletto heels and her beloved pearl and sapphire choker.
The choker was originally a brooch given to her by the Queen Mother.
Diana’s little black dress was daring in many ways.
By opting for a shorter evening look in black (a colour the Royal Family normally reserved for mourning), the Princess was breaking away from the traditional dress code.
The outfit represented the death of her marriage as she walked away from her life as a royal and emerged as a new woman.
Although three years earlier the princess had been too nervous to wear it because it was “too daring,” that night it looked perfect on her.
The Daily Mail’s coverage of Princess Diana’s iconic revenge dress at the time in 1994
Prince Charles confessed to having been unfaithful to Diana in an interview with Jonathan Dimbleby (left) on June 29, 1994
Mr Dimbleby asked Charles if he had been “faithful” to Diana, to which he replied “Yes”, adding: “Until (the marriage) broke down irretrievably, after we both tried.”
It was everything any other royal woman wouldn’t have worn to a public event.
Photographer Mark Saunders, author of Dicing with Di, said in the 1997 documentary Diana: In Search of Happiness: ‘Everyone remembers the night of the Dimbleby interview when Prince Charles admitted an affair with Camilla Parker-Bowles and look how he appeared Diana at the Serpentine Gallery.
“My God, that was brilliant and I applaud her for it, I thought it was great. But that’s what Diana does, she manipulates and she’s very good at it.”
Diana’s former stylist Anna Harvey said in the 2013 documentary Princess Diana’s Gowns: The Auction that she wanted to hold her head high in whatever she chose to wear that night.
Ms Harvey said: “She wanted to look like a millionaire and she did it.” The stylist also wrote in Vogue that the princess was “keen” to make an impact.
But the decision was not easy for Diana, according to Paul Burrell, her former butler.
Princess Diana speaking to the designer who created the revenge dress, Christina Stambolian (in black jacket)
Christina Stambolian (pictured) says she remembers Princess Diana ordering a “special dress for a special occasion” from her shop in 1991.
She told Channel 5’s Secrets of the Royal Dressmakers documentary: ‘She said: ‘I can’t go, I can’t face the world knowing what Charles has just said.
“And I have nothing to wear anyway.” I went into her dressing room, pulled out the Christina Stambolian dress and showed it to her.
She also added that she was worried that the tight dress would no longer fit, as she had bought it three years earlier.
He said, “I zipped it up and it looked like a million dollars.”
And for a couple of hours, at least, her husband’s television confession was forgotten, while all eyes were on Diana.
