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Black Givenchy dress of Audrey Hepburn

Black Givenchy dress of Audrey Hepburn
Hepburn little black dress.jpg
Designer Givenchy
Year 1961 (1961)
Type Sheath little black dress
Material Italian satin

The black Givenchy dress of Audrey Hepburn is a little black dress designed by Hubert de Givenchy and worn by Audrey Hepburn in the opening of the 1961 romantic comedy film Breakfast at Tiffany's. The dress is cited as one of the most iconic items of clothing in the history of the twentieth century and perhaps the most famous "little black dress" of all time.

Audrey Hepburn was a close friend of French designer Givenchy, referring to the designer as her "best friend" while he considered her his "sister".

In 1961, Givenchy designed a little black dress for the opening scene of Blake Edwards' romantic comedy, Breakfast at Tiffany's, where Hepburn plays a leading role alongside actor George Peppard. Her necklace was made by Roger Scemama, a French parurier who designed jewelleries for Givenchy. Audrey took two copies of the dress back to Paramount, but the dresses, which revealed a considerable amount of Audrey's leg, were not suitable for the movie and the lower half of the dress was redesigned by Edith Head. The original hand-stitched dress is currently in Givenchy's private archive, whilst one copy Audrey took back to Paramount is on display at The Museum of Film in Madrid and another was auctioned at Christie's in December 2006. None of the actual dresses created by Givenchy were used in either the movie or the promotional photography. The movie poster was designed by artist Robert McGinnis, and in Sam Wasson's book, Fifth Avenue, 5am, he explains that the photos on which he based the poster did not show any leg and that he had added the leg to make the poster more appealing. The actual dresses used in the movie, created by Edith Head, were destroyed by Head and Hepburn at Western Costume in California after shooting.

In November 2006, Natalie Portman appeared on the cover of Harper's Bazaar, wearing one of the original Givenchy dresses created for Breakfast at Tiffany's. On 5 December 2006, this dress was auctioned at Christie's in London and purchased by an anonymous buyer by telephone. The sale price was estimated by the auction house to have ended somewhere between £50,000 and £70,000, but the final price was £467,200 ($923,187). The money raised in the auction of the black dress went toward helping build a school for the poor people of Calcutta. It so happened that Givenchy, the designer of the dress, had donated the dress to Dominique Lapierre, the author of the book City of Joy, and his wife to help raise funds for the charity. When they witnessed such a frenzied auction, the amount that was raised so astonished Lapierre that he observed, "I'm absolutely dumbfounded to believe that a piece of cloth which belonged to such a magical actress will now enable me to buy bricks and cement to put the most destitute children in the world into schools." Sarah Hodgson, a film specialist at Christie's said, "This is one of the most famous black dresses in the world—an iconic piece of cinematic history—and we are glad it fetched a historic price."


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