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Princess Diana is known for being one of the biggest fashion icons of the 1980s and ’90s, and one of her most recognisable clothing pieces is her bright red winter jumper.
The bright knitted jumper was first worn by Diana in 1981 when she was 19 years old to a polo match four months after her engagement to King Charles was announced.
This distinctive Christmas jumper by Warm and Wonderful features patterned white sheep with one noticeable single black sheep in the middle, which Diana wore with jeans and a Peter Pan collared shirt.
In 1983, the original jumper was given back to the Warm and Wonderful founders Joanna Osborne and Sally Muir to repatch, but at the time, they sent the Princess a brand new jumper instead.
The original was forgotten about and lay in an attic of one of the designers for over 40 years only to be rediscovered this March, and in September it was auctioned off for $1.14 million (£920,000) in New York.
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The sweater was also auctioned alongside two thank you letters in which Diana described the sweater as her “much-loved knit.”
Diana wearing the sweater and making it one of her favourite fashion pieces made Warm and Wonderful go from a small business to a popular brand.
In an interview with Bazaar, designer Joanna Osborne said: “Much to our amazement, the first we knew of Lady Diana Spencer wearing the sweater was when we saw her on the front page of one of the Sunday newspapers.
“Her influence was impactful almost immediately thereafter, leading to a surge in sales and public awareness of our small label, for which we will be forever grateful.”
Warm and Wonderful stopped producing the jumper in 1994 but it has been brought back in the last few years due to renewed interest in Diana’s fashion.
One of the biggest reasons the jumper is back in demand is because it was featured in episode three of season four of The Crown, in which the fictional version of Diana (played by Emma Corrin) is seen wearing it in the Netflix series.
On the Warm and Wonderful website, the jumper retails at £265 ($295) and needs to be preordered due to it being knitted by hand and due to its popularity.
The sheep jumper comes in bright green, pastel blue, and pastel pink as well as the ‘Diana Edition’ bright red. It also comes in a diverse range of sizes, from XS to XXXL.
Copies of the iconic jumper can sometimes be found on online stores such as Etsy and eBay, which are usually secondhand, and are often a lot cheaper for around £50 to £100.
