Now one of the favourite items of clothing belonging to Grace Kelly is set to go on public display – and it’s not a couture ballgown or fur coat.
It is a simple black cashmere Pringle cardigan that she lovingly passed on to her eldest daughter, Princess Caroline.
It features in a new exhibition celebrating 200 years of Hawick-based knitwear firm Pringle of Scotland.
And the curator – fashion historian Alistair O’Neill – says Princess Grace of Monaco’s passion for Pringle was no public act.
The princess was one of several Hollywood leading ladies who publicly endorsed the brand, but Alistair reveals it was also her clothing of choice away from the limelight.
They were also shown rare family snaps and home movies of Princess Grace dressed in the Pringle outfits she loved.
Alistair said: “It was a huge honour for us. One of the photos shows Princess Grace wearing sunglasses and was taken not long after her marriage.
“This is private image of a private moment and the Pringle garment she is wearing is part of her own private wardrobe.”
Alistair said that although Grace was known for glamour and sophistication on set, she also had a strong sense of practicality.
He added: “She purchased a lot of her Scottish knitwear at London’s Burlington Arcade and she liked to wear twinsets.
“In many ways her Pringle garments were a connection between her two lives – her life on camera and her private life.
“She liked twinsets as she liked the functionality of having two layers of knitwear.
“She might just wear the jumper while filming, then off camera, while waiting for her next scene, she could pull on the cardigan.”
Famed for her generous nature, Princess Grace was known to give away her clothes – including many of her Pringle favourites – to her family and friends.
The cardigan set to go on display in Edinburgh has been in Caroline’s wardrobe since her mother gave it to her several years before her death in a car crash in 1982. She was just 52.
Caroline said she had been delighted to work with Alistair’s fashion students on the project and even got in touch with her mother’s former laundress to research Grace’s wardrobe.
She said: “Marielle was our head laundress. She arrived at the palace just before I was born and she still remembers everything.
“We had a lot of trouble finding things because my mother gave a lot away to her friends and family. I pinched a few when I was 16, 17.
“In the last 15 years of her life, my mother dressed completely differently.
“She would have gone more for very warm clothes, because she was always cold,
“She would always have a scarf or a cashmere shawl.
“She had a lot of shawls from Pringle, she was such a faithful and enthusiastic customer.”
The Edinburgh exhibition marks the company’s bicentenary, tracing their evolution from a small hosiery firm founded by Robert Pringle in 1815 to an international fashion knitwear brand.
Other highlights of the exhibition include a 1933 outfit worn by golfer Gloria Minoprio, and a classic twinset designed by Otto Weisz.
Georgina Ripley, curator of modern and contemporary fashion and textiles at National Museums Scotland, said: “Pringle of Scotland has a long, rich and complex history, and has evolved to become one of the world’s top heritage fashion brands.”
Alistair added: “Fully Fashioned is a useful opportunity to not only mark Pringle’s 200th anniversary, but to demonstrate the centrality of knitwear to the modern wardrobe.
“The twinset has such an enduring sense of modernity about it, that it is exciting to be able to set this design classic into a broader context, showing how Scottish knitwear led the field in modernising the 20th century wardrobe.”
Fully Fashioned: The Pringle of Scotland Story’ runs from April 10 to August 16 at the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh.
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