White and blue dress worn by Whoopi Goldberg as Celie in The Color Purple: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

White cotton dress with blue trim worn by Whoopi Goldberg as the character Celie Harris Johnson in the film "The Color Purple." The white cotton is printed in black with a small repeating geometric design. The dress has elbow-length sleeves trimmed in blue cotton. The blue cotton is also sewn around the waistband, at the neck, and along the top of a patch pocket with a diagonal opening on the proper right hip of the A-line skirt. The blue band on the front of the neck crosses under the two blue side bands, with four (4) round mother of pearl buttons, one at each pointed end of the bands. The dress closes at the center back bodice with three (3) round buttons, two mother of pearl and one clear plastic. The dress is not lined. There are two labels along the interior proper left button band on the back bodice, the top label is a barcode adhered directly to the fabric with printed text above the barcode reading "PALACE COSTUME CO." and text below the barcode reading "37500868"; the bottom label is an off-white clothing tag with handwritten text in black reading "D113" above printed text reading "Palace Costume Co."

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 1985
• Designed by: Aggie Guerard Rodgers, American, born 1943
• Manufactured by: Palace Costume Company, American, founded 1990
• Worn by: Whoopi Goldberg, American, born 1955
• Subject of: Alice Walker, American, born 1944
• Type: dresses
• Medium: cotton with mother of pearl and plastic buttons
• Dimensions: H x W x D (On form): 52 1/4 × 21 1/2 × 14 1/2 in. (132.7 × 54.6 × 36.8 cm)
• Place used: North Carolina, United States, North and Central America
• Place used: California, United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Actors
• Topic: Clothing and dress
• Topic: Costume
• Topic: Costume design
• Topic: Design
• Topic: Families
• Topic: Film
• Object number: 2014.184.2
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: No Known Copyright Restrictions Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.