How one hapless shop assistant turned away the soon-to-be fashion icon
She was the most glamorous woman in the world, who designers could only dream of dressing, and her style is still emulated decades after her death. But just before she married Prince Charles, in 1981, Lady Diana visited a top London boutique to buy her engagement outfit and had her very own Pretty Woman experience.
When she went to the salon by herself one Friday evening, she didn’t find a warm welcome. In a real-life version of the iconic ’90s movie scene, where Julia Roberts’s character Vivian Ward is sent packing from a fancy Beverly Hills boutique, Diana had her own humiliating encounter.
What happened next? Well, you remember Julia’s immortal line: “Big mistake.” Keep reading, and we’ll tell you this incredible story of bad timing and mistaken impressions, from the people who knew Diana best.
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What was Diana’s style like before she became a royal?
It’s hard to believe now, but before Princess Diana was engaged to Prince Charles, she had a modest—and minimalist—wardrobe. She wore floral skirts and blouses, jeans and sweaters.
“Diana had been called a fashion icon, but at the start, she was incredibly unsophisticated about it all,” British Vogue editor Anna Harvey, who Diana later enlisted to style her, said in the magazine. “It’s hard to imagine now, but she really had nothing in her own wardrobe—a few Laura Ashley blouses and skirts and some bobbly jumpers. That was it.”
It’s true. Despite the fact that she’d go on to have access to the top designers in the world, when she was known as “Shy Di” she hardly owned any clothes at all. “I literally had one long dress, one silk shirt, one smart pair of shoes and that was it. My mother and I had to go and buy six of everything,” Diana later told biographer Andrew Morton.
“We bought as much as we thought we needed, but we still didn’t have enough. Bear in mind you have to change four times a day, and suddenly your wardrobe expands to something unbelievable.”
What happened at the London boutique?
Diana was about to formally announce her engagement to Prince Charles, so the pressure was on to find something suitable to wear. Her mother, Frances Shand Kydd, directed her to society designer David Sassoon, one half of the upscale Bellville Sassoon salon, in Knightsbridge.
Inside the salon, a hesitant young Diana browsed the racks, searching for the right outfit for her engagement. Watching her was a snooty shop assistant, who decided the shy, scruffy 19-year-old didn’t have the goods for the upmarket fashion on display. Diana didn’t know exactly what she wanted, and just like in Pretty Woman, the formidable assistant became impatient with the young girl.
In a scene straight out of the movie, where the shop assistant says, “I don’t think we have anything for you. You’re obviously in the wrong place,” the haughty French vendeuse at Bellville Sassoon told Diana, “Why don’t you go to Harrods dear, you’ll find what you’re looking for there.”
Big mistake, indeed.
So what did Diana do?
She was told to go to Harrods, so she went to Harrods!
In the famed London department store, Diana settled on the outfit she would wear to her engagement announcement. She picked out a cobalt blue Cojana skirt suit, and a delicate crepe blouse with a pussy-bow tie from Emanuel. This top started a huge trend at the time and became known as the “Lady Di blouse.” David and Elizabeth Emanuel would of course go on to design Diana’s wedding dress.
Three decades later, in 2010, Prince William announced his engagement to Kate Middleton—who, in an homage to Diana—also wore a cobalt blue wrap dress by Issa, plus Diana’s diamond-and-sapphire engagement ring.
What happened at the boutique after that?
When Sassoon and Belinda Belville (the other half of Belville Sassoon) heard from another shop assistant that the young lady looked a lot like Lady Diana Spencer, they were aghast.
“We nearly had a fit,” Sassoon later told the Daily Mail. Fortunately, they repaired the blunder and Diana returned to the store with her mother to buy her wedding trousseau. It began a long relationship with the label.
“She was a joy to dress. She could wear any color and look wonderful,” Sassoon said. “Some of the royal ladies could be difficult, but Diana would always send little thank-you notes or twirl around saying, ‘They’re going to love this!’ She really was a delight.”
Sassoon would go on to design more than 70 outfits for Diana, including a sailor suit for her first official portrait with Charles and Queen Elizabeth, an off-the-shoulder evening gown she wore to the V&A museum in 1981 and a striking red-striped coat to announce her pregnancy with Prince William.
What happened to the snooty saleswoman?
We can only imagine the regret of the shop assistant when she was told exactly who Diana was marrying! To the boutique’s credit, she wasn’t fired, but she never got to serve the princess when she shopped there again. “From then on, whenever Diana appeared, we kept the vendeuse out of the way,” Sassoon said. Ouch.
Which designers did Diana wear?
Diana initially supported British designers. “She wanted to wear British because she felt it was something positive she could do for the fashion industry,” Harvey said in Vogue. “She was a very English girl, and the romantic style suited her.” As well as Bellville Sassoon, she favored Emanuel, Catherine Walker and Bruce Oldfield.
But after her separation, Diana became much freer with her style and labels, wearing Versace, Chanel and Dior, who named a bag after her. “Everyone was thrilled to do things for her; there was such a feeling of euphoria that here was this young, glamorous girl who loved clothes,” Harvey said.
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Sources:
- British Vogue: “How one Vogue editor helped curate Diana’s wardrobe”
- Daily Mail: “David Sassoon on how he helped Diana become a fashion icon”
- Express: “Claudia Joseph on Diana’s Pretty Woman moment”
- Diana: Her True Story – In Her Own Words by Andrew Morton
- ITN Archive: “Charles and Diana Engagement Interview”
