A Hollywood fashion crime has recently been committed, and the Internet is abuzz with this dress-stealing incident.
TMZ first reported that the custom-made Calvin Klein gown Lupita Nyong’o wore to the Oscars just a couple of days ago was stolen from her London hotel room in West Hollywood while the actress was out.
It was believed to have been taken between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. on Tuesday. “I can confirm a dress was stolen from the London Hotel that belonged to the actress Lupita Nyong’o,” a member of the L.A. sheriff’s department confirmed to the press.
“We believe it was taken sometime during the day yesterday 2/25. We are looking at every scenario; when the cleaners go to clean the rooms they do it with the door open so that’s a possibility. Currently we are still investigating, detectives are interviewing and looking for witnesses.”
At the 2015 Oscars, Lupita Nyong’o commanded attention in her stunning Calvin Klein gown embellished with 6,000 pearls, and the custom-made dress was later stolen from her hotel room (Credit: Calvin Klein’s Twitter)
The gorgeous white gown, decorated with 6,000 natural white pearls, is valued at a whopping $150,000!
Specially designed by Francisco Costa for the Calvin Klein Collection, the ivory-colored frock was handmade by 25 people and took ten weeks to sew.
Lupita Nyong’o in a pearl-encrusted Calvin Klein Collection dress at the 87th Annual Oscars held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on February 22, 2015 (Credit: Adriana M. Barraza / WENN)
Celebrity-related items are typically valued at a higher price because of the name associated with them. Still, a high-profile dress, which even made it to the Oscars best-dressed list, would be pretty hard to sell in the black market.
Lupita Nyong’o in a stunning ivory Calvin Klein Collection halter dress adorned with 6,000 pearls and diamond drop earrings (Credit: Adriana M. Barraza / WENN)
Law enforcement investigated the situation and reviewed security camera footage to clarify the heist.
The American fashion house Calvin Klein expressed concern for the missing dress on Thursday night with a tweet of a close-up photo captioned “Have you seen this dress?” and a witty hashtag #freethepearls.
Lupita Nyong’o made a fashion statement at the 2015 Oscars even though she wasn’t nominated or didn’t star in a nominated film (Credit: Adriana M. Barraza / WENN)
TMZ later reported that the stolen pearl dress had been recovered after an anonymous guy called them at around 2:30 p.m. on Friday to tip off the location of the returned gown.
According to the caller, they took the dress after noticing that Lupita’s hotel room door was left ajar. The culprits then took off two pearls from the dress and brought them to a garment district somewhere in LA to be evaluated.
After being told that the pearls were fakes, they took the dress back to the hotel and left it in a garbage bag inside a bathroom.
The culprit told TMZ he wanted to return the dress and expose the fake pearls to show the world “Hollywood’s fake bulls**t.”
Now, we’re wondering if this is true; if it is, then how many more of the gorgeous (and highly expensive) jewel-embellished dresses we have seen on red carpet events are fakes?