Princess Diana’s workout sweater just sold at auction for $76,500

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That’s one pricey piece of activewear.

Well, you blew it. Unless you are the “collector in California who wishes to remain anonymous,” you did not manage to outbid everyone else in order to acquire Princess Diana’s old Virgin Atlantic sweatshirt.

The athleisure in question was a gift from Virgin Atlantic’s founder Richard Branson to Princess Diana, and then a gift from Princess Diana to her trainer, Jenni Rivett, over two decades ago—a kind of gym clothes pay-it-forward.

Rivett put it up for auction, promising to put proceeds to “help a Malawian family based in South Africa.” The auction house, RR Auction, announced that it went for US$53,532 (AU$76,579).

The piece was special not just because Princess Diana wore it, but because she used it. “I remember one of her strategies was that she was going to wear the same Virgin Active sweatshirt every single session,” Rivett told Yahoo’s The Royal Box recently.

Many paparazzi-plagued celebrities have borrowed this strategy since, like English actor Richard Madden, who recently admitted to The New York Times, “I wear the same clothes days in a row, because if it looks like the same day, they can’t run the pictures. There’s only so many photos you can have of me with a green juice walking down the street.” Or a royal in a ratty old sweatshirt walking down the street. Princess Diana has lessons to teach yet.

This story was first published by VanityFair.com.

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