International museums form taskforce to prevent repeat of Kim Kardashian Marilyn Monroe dress saga

A new taskforce is taking aim at celebrities wanting to wear historic garments, after Kim Kardashian reportedly damaged Marilyn Monroe’s dress at the Met Gala.

Museums around the world have formed a committee to ensure historical garments are never put at risk again, after Kim Kardashian allegedly damaged a famous Marilyn Monroe dress.

The International Council of Museums formed a new committee to advise in preserving heritage garments in the wake of the allegations Ms Kardashian damaged Marilyn Monroe’s Happy Birthday dress when she wore it to the Met Gala last month.

An avid collector and owner of the Marilyn Monroe Collection, Scott Fortner, accused the reality TV star of damaging the dress, claiming it was missing some crystals and some were hanging by a thread.

Ms Kardashian has avidly denied any wrongdoing and Ripley’s Believe it or Not museum, which owns the dress and loaned it to Ms Kardashian for the MET appearance, has also defended her.

Kim Kardashian wore Marilyn Munroe’s 1962 Happy Birthday dress to the Met Gala in May, where she is accused of damaging it. Picture: John Shearer/Getty Images

In a statement to E!, Ripley’s said: “She did not, in any way, damage the garment in the short amount of time if was worn at the Met Gala”.

“From the bottom of the Met steps, where Kim got into the dress, to the top where it was returned, the dress was in the same condition it started in,” Ripley’s vice president of publishing and licensing Amanda Joiner said.

Ripley’s purchased the famous dress from its previous owner for $US4.8 million ($A6.93m) at Julien’s auction in 2016.

A quality report at the time stated a “number of the seams are pulled and word. This is not surprising given how delicate the material is”.

Pictures showing damage to the Marilyn Munroe dress worn by Kim Kardashian. Instagram

Pictures showing damage to the Marilyn Munroe dress worn by Kim Kardashian. Instagram

The saga has spurred the International Council of Museums (ICOM), whose members include the Smithsonian, The Getty Foundation and UNESCO, to form a new costume committee in response to the reported “fashion loss”, the New York Post reports.

The committee’s purpose will be to preserve heritage fashion like Munroe’s gemstone-covered dress, which committee treasurer Ninke Bloemberg, who is also the fashion curator at the Centraal Museum in Utrecht, described as “irreplaceable”.

ICOM committee would not have authority to stop A-listers wearing heritage garments but has put together guidelines for preserving such historic items.

“Historic garments should not be worn by anybody, public or private figures,” ICOM said in a statement.

“Prevention is better than cure. Wrong treatment will destroy an object forever.”

Pete Davidson and Kim Kardashian attend the 2022 Met Gala New York City. Picture: Getty Images

Kevin Jones, who is curator of FIDM Museum in Los Angeles, which is not an ICOM member, said the decision to let Ms Kardashian wear the dress to the Met Gala was not a uninformed spur of the moment call.

“Whatever the motivation was for wearing it, did it justify the known damage that would happen to the garment?,” he asked.

“Simply put, wearing a dress like this — especially while walking up a grand staircase, which it was not designed to handle — is like driving an extremely rare, one-of-a-kind automobile in a drag race.”

The dress, which was custom-made by Bob Mackie, was worn by Monroe in 1962 when she sang “Happy Birthday” to then-President John F Kenney.