Conservators 'speechless' that Kim Kardashian wore Marilyn Monroe's dress to Met Gala

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https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2022-05-03/kim-kardashian-marilyn-monroe-dress-2022-met-gala-conservators

Textile conservators and fashion curators are appalled that beauty mogul Kim Kardashian donned Marilyn Monroe’s iconic Jean Louis gown for the 2022 Met Gala. Monroe’s show-stopping garment became famous 60 years ago when the Hollywood legend wore it to sing a breathless “Happy Birthday” to President Kennedy.

Kardashian, a pop culture phenom in her own right, became the only other person to slip into the historic garment for Monday’s Met Gala, a “gilded glamour"-themed affair at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. “The Kardashians” star joined hundreds toasting the opening of the Costume Institute’s newest exhibition, “In America: An Anthology of Fashion,” which examines historical context and tells stories of unsung heroes in early American fashion design.

“I’m frustrated because it sets back what is considered professional treatment for historic costume,” says Sarah Scaturro, chief conservator at the Cleveland Museum of Art and formerly a conservator at the Met’s Costume Institute. “In the ’80s, a bunch of costume professionals came together to state a resolution that historic costume should not be worn. So my worry is that colleagues in historic costume collections are now going to be pressured by important people to let them wear garments.”

Cara Varnell, a longtime independent art conservator specializing in historic dress, put it this way: “We just don’t wear archived historic pieces,” she says. “Obviously, if you have a Charles James hanging in your grandmother’s closet and you want to wear it, fine. But something that’s archived means it has enough cultural importance that we value it and want to save it. The dress represents something very important — it’s part of our collective cultural heritage. I’m speechless over it.”

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2022/may/03/kim-kardashian-wears-marilyn-monroes-jfk-dress-as-met-gala-celebrates-gilded-age

As well as bleaching her hair platinum blond, Kardashian said she lost 16 pounds (7kg) in less than a month to fit into the dress.

“It was such a challenge,” she said. “It was like a role. I was determined to fit this. I would wear a sauna suit twice a day, run on the treadmill, completely cut out all sugar and all carbs, and just eat the cleanest veggies and protein.”

Acquiring the dress was a challenge, too. The piece sold in 2016 for $US4.8m and holds the record for the most expensive dress sold at auction, as reported by Vogue.

Now usually stored in a temperature-controlled vault at Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Museum in Orlando, Florida, the gown was transported to Kardashian’s home in Calabasas, California by private plane and accompanied by guards.