Princess Diana's iconic purple dress will be auctioned at Sotheby's

A tulip-shaped aubergine velvet strapless dress worn by the late Diana, Princess of Wales, in a royal portrait alongside the then Prince of Wales in 1991, and which later appeared in a Vanity Fair shoot in 1997, will be sold at a Sotheby's auction in New York on January 27.

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Estimated value between $80,000 and $120,000, the dress, designed by Victor Edelstein , previously sold for $24,150 in the 1997 auction which included 80 dresses from Princess Diana's personal collection to benefit the AIDS Crisis Trust and the Royal Marsden Hospital Cancer Fund.

The dress originally appeared in Edelstein's Fall 1989 collection. He was one of Princess Diana's go-to designers for over a decade, from 1982 to 1993.

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An aubergine velvet dress worn by Diana, Princess of Wales, by Victor Edelstein. Courtesy

In 1991, British painter Douglas Hardinge Anderson depicted Diana wearing the dress in a painting now hanging on the Royal Marsden Hospital Cancer Fund, which she visited.

The dress was later featured on Franklin Mint's 1998 limited edition Princess Diana doll, in part of a collection of 1,000 dolls wearing her most famous dresses.

The dress is part of Sotheby's inaugural auction "The One", which aims to present an unprecedented selection of the best products in history.

A painting of Diana, Princess of Wales, currently hanging in the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust. The Royal Marsden Hospital Cancer Fund