Meghan Markle's black-and-white Armani dress, which she wore during her March 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, has been named 2021's Dress of the Year by the Fashion Museum Bath in England.
The television special, which the Duchess of Sussex took part in with Prince Harry, was considered a "bombshell" interview, in which the couple revealed details of the duchess' treatment since marrying into the UK royal family and explained their 2020 decision to step back as senior royals.
The dress, which Markle wore for the main interview, is a silk georgette dress which sold for $4,700 and is still available to buy in the US. It is a part of Giorgio Armani's spring/summer 2022 cruise collection and features lotus flower embroidery with a matching belt.
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The dress has been on show at Fashion Museum Bath since February 22, as part of the A History of Fashion in 100 Objects exhibition.
Along with a key figure in the UK fashion industry, the museum selects a dress annually that "encapsulates the prevailing mood of fashion, represents the past year, and captures the imagination."
The 2021 selectors were Dazed magazine’s Ibrahim Kamara and Gareth Wrighton, who were behind the 2020 dress of the year, named the Dress of Hope.
“In today’s hyper-stylised pop culture, the Dress of the Year now has the potential to also be ‘meme of the year’ and we both latched upon Meghan and Harry’s now-iconic interview with Oprah as the definitive anti-establishment moment that will forever endure in the British collective consciousness," said Kamara and Wrighton of the piece.
“Meghan’s wrap dress by Armani, worn to showcase a divine pregnancy, framed the Duchess in black against the bountiful landscaping of Tyler Perry’s Hollywood garden. This look now, through sheer association with a viral television moment, is firmly ingrained in our pop culture psyche.”
It is no secret that high-profile people portray messages through their fashion choices. At the time of the CBS interview, it was speculated that Markle's choice of the lotus flower print was deliberate, given the flower's "symbolic association with rebirth, self-regeneration and spiritual enlightenment, and its ability to flourish despite seemingly challenging conditions," says the Fashion Museum Bath.
Look back at the Duchess of Sussex's best fashion moments here:
