Elizabeth Emanuel speaks to HELLO! about designing the iconic gown
and ex-husband David, designers of the "iconic dress", were about to embark on their own 'rags to riches' story too. In a career spanning four decades, London-born Elizabeth would go on to dress a number of A-list stars including Madonna, Cher, Elizabeth Taylor, Charlize Theron and Priyanka Chopra.Elizabeth, who turned 70 earlier this month, lifts the veil on how the Royal College of Art graduates came to design the world's most famous wedding dress.
The dress in question was a little black one she wore when accompanying her future husband to a charity recital at Goldsmith's Hall, just a few months before her big day."I think it was a transformation dress because up until that point she’d been wearing very romantic dresses, ball gowns, that kind of thing. And then, when she wore the black dress, she looked like a movie star," says Elizabeth.
"Our staff were wonderful and very loyal and didn't talk to anybody. We had the dress stored every night in a metal cabinet guarded by two guards, Jim and Bert. So there was somebody there 24 hours a day and we put shutters on all our windows, and we put false colour threads in the rubbish bins because people were going through our bins," says Elizabeth."We made a back-up dress just in case the secret came out, which fortunately it didn't," says Elizabeth.
The ivory silk and taffeta lace gown was decorated with hand embroidery, sequins and 10,000 pearls. It also featured a 25-foot train – the longest in the history of royal wedding dresses, which could only finally be unrolled at a special final fitting at Buckingham Palace. Watch the moment newlyweds Diana and Charles leave St Paul's after their ceremony..."It was controversial and very new.