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- Princess Diana Museum Founder Takes Out Fourth Mortgage to Secure Priceless Royal Wardrobe: 'I Was Shaking' (Exclusive)</p>
<p>Janine Henni, Sean MandellJune 28, 2025 at 10:11 PM</p>
<p>Renae Plant, founder of The Princess Diana Museum, came to a landmark auction with her wallet in hand — and walked away with a treasure trove of Princess Diana's iconic fashion.</p>
<p>On June 26, the devoted Diana admirer spent nearly $1.9 million on 35 pieces tied to the Princess of Wales at Julien's Auctions' Princess Diana's Style & A Royal Collection sale in Los Angeles. Held at The Peninsula Beverly Hills, the event featured over 300 lots — including several of Diana's never-before-auctioned ensembles.</p>
<p>Speaking exclusively to PEOPLE from inside the auction room, Plant revealed the emotional and financial lengths she went to in order to secure the pieces — including taking out another mortgage on her home.</p>
<p>"When you see them go for so little, you can't not preserve them, if that makes any sense. Because we're not rich. We're not wealthy. This is all from donations. We always mortgage our house when we do this kind of stuff," Plant tells PEOPLE.</p>
<p>Tim Vechik</p>
<p>Renae Plant and Livinio Stuyck Sanchez at "Princess Diana's Style & A Royal Collection" sale in Los Angeles on June 26, 2025.</p>
<p>The curator confirmed it was "maybe the third or fourth time" she and her husband, Livinio Stuyck Sanchez, had mortgaged their home — and this time, they left Julien's auction with a historic haul.</p>
<p>Among the standout pieces: Princess Diana's iconic "Caring Dress," evening gowns by signature designers Elizabeth Emanuel and Catherine Walker (whose looks are still worn today by Kate Middleton), more than a dozen pairs of Diana's shoes, and the peach plume hat she wore during her honeymoon sendoff with then-Prince Charles.</p>
<p>In one of the auction's most emotional moments, Plant collapsed to the floor after winning the vibrant "Caring Dress" — the same outfit Diana wore when the two met 37 years ago during the royal couple's tour of Australia. Plant, then 18, had a brief but powerful encounter with the princess that sparked her lifelong mission to honor Diana's legacy.</p>
<p>As captured in an exclusive video for PEOPLE, she secured the floral frock with a winning bid of $400,000 — totaling $520,000 with fees.</p>
<p>Tim Graham Photo Library via Getty</p>
<p>Princess Diana in Seville, Spain on May 21, 1992.</p>
<p>"I feel like this dress, the 'Caring Dress,' just absolutely represents her kindness, her compassion, her humanitarianism and absolutely represents everything that the Princess Diana Museum stands for and what we've been doing," Plant tells PEOPLE, explaining why she couldn't walk away without it.</p>
<p>Designed by Bellville Sassoon, the "Caring Dress" was a standout of the sale — not only for its vibrant floral print but for its emotional legacy. Diana wore the cheerful frock on several occasions between 1988 and 1992, often during hospital visits and moments of connection with patients. The late designer David Sassoon once said the nickname came from its association with those heartfelt encounters.</p>
<p>"I was shaking," Plant recalls of the moment she realized it was hers. "Diana was definitely looking over us today."</p>
<p>Tim Vechik</p>
<p>Renae Plant and Livinio Stuyck Sanchez at "Princess Diana's Style & A Royal Collection" sale in Los Angeles on June 26, 2025.</p>
<p>"That's our angel number — 333, Diana's angel number," Plant says, referring to her paddle. "She's been guiding me for the last decade to do this for her."</p>
<p>Plant launched the virtual Princess Diana Museum in 2019, and the collection — which houses more than 2,700 of Diana's personal and historical items — is considered one of the largest of its kind in the world.</p>
<p>At the auction, Plant and Sanchez also secured several accessories they say will play a key role in deepening the museum's storytelling and preserving the emotional threads of Diana's legacy.</p>
<p>"We've already got a hundred pieces of clothing that once belonged to Diana, and so there were so many accessories that were in there today that it was really important for us to reunite those accessories with the outfits that we already have to tell a full story and to reunite those pieces," she tells PEOPLE.</p>
<p>Sanchez adds, "That, for us, was key, to have all those other items that tell the story that we wanted to tell, especially coming for next year that we're planning to put it all out to the collection and a traveling exhibit."</p>
<p>The couple reveals that they are planning to present their extensive collection of Princess Diana artifacts in a traveling exhibit to be unveiled at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, California, in November.</p>
<p>"The dream is to start here. It's going to be local and then we're going to travel the world and let everybody see it," Plant tells PEOPLE. "But our dream is to take it back to the U.K. where it belongs, and then have it be a permanent place there to always be respected and honored, way after we're gone."</p>
<p>Princess Diana Archive/Getty</p>
<p>Prince Charles and Princess Diana arrive at Romsey Station in England on July 29, 1981.</p>
<p>For Plant, the passion for preserving Diana's fashion goes far beyond the clothes themselves — it's a deeply personal mission rooted in care and reverence.</p>
<p>"People sometimes buy things to wear or put on. It is not like that for us. This is really preserving historical artifacts and just being able to tell Diana's story and her legacy and for future generations," she says.</p>
<p>Tim Graham Photo Library/Getty</p>
<p>Princess Diana in Milan, Italy on April 22, 1985.</p>
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<p>Princess Diana died at age 36 in 1997 following a car accident in Paris. Her humanitarian legacy, deep empathy for others, and iconic sense of style continue to captivate the world nearly three decades later.</p>
<p>"Diana is a draw. And so museums know that if they have Princess Diana, people would show up all over the world," Julien's Auctions co-founder and executive director Martin Nolan tells PEOPLE at the event. "She went to Asia, she went to Australia, obviously North America and Europe. And so anywhere that there's a museum that has something from Diana, people would show up."</p>
<p>A portion of the proceeds from the June 26 auction benefitted Muscular Dystrophy UK, connecting to Princess Diana's charitable legacy.</p>
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