Kim Kardashian wasn’t surprised about getting slammed for sporting Marilyn Monroe’s iconic dress at the 2022 Met Gala.
In the latest episode of “The Kardashians,” the Skims founder described feeling “nervous” about her plan to wear the gown.
“I’m a little nervous some people will hate, and just be like, ‘How dare she think she can step into Marilyn’s dress,’” Kardashian said during Thursday’s episode of the show. “And I get that.”
At the fashion event, the TV star showed up in Monroe’s iconic dress — the exact one the Hollywood icon donned in 1962 when she sang a legendary breathy rendition of the “Happy Birthday” song to then-president John F. Kennedy for his 45th birthday.
Kardashian’s bold move marked only the second time in history that the famous garment was tried on, according to an Instagram post from Ripley’s museum, which housed the dress.
The reality TV star worked with the museum to preserve the piece of pop culture by carefully transporting it with gloves and ensuring she only wore the dress for a limited period of time on the red carpet.
On the latest episode of “The Kardashians,” she described the laborious process of getting clearance for the fashion moment.
In one clip, while examining a replica of the gown, Kardashian admitted that she feared she couldn’t fit the historic garment over her frame.
“If this does not fit me, like, I can’t even try the original,” she told her stylist, Danielle Levi.
Even when it came to replicas of the gown, she explained, “No one trusted us; for years, they would never send samples.”
“Then once I would get to Paris and try on the samples, they would be like, ‘Oh, wait, she actually fits in our stuff.’ So I don’t know how to convince the guy who owns the original Marilyn dress that I’m a shapeshifter,” she added.
Kardashian lost 16 pounds in three weeks to squeeze into the garment because it wouldn’t fully zip over her frame.
“I would wear a sauna suit twice a day, run on the treadmill, completely cut out all sugar and all carbs, and just eat the cleanest veggies and protein,” she told Vogue on the red carpet. “I didn’t starve myself, but I was so strict.”
Despite her dieting and exercising, the dress only partially fastened, causing her to rock a white, vintage fur coat that draped over the exposed zipper.
After the initial big reveal on the red carpet, Kardashian changed into a replica dress to protect the original.
ANGELA WEISS via Getty Images
Even with Kardashian’s extra measures to preserve the dress and the blonde bombshell’s legacy, many denounced her decision, including Bob Mackie, the costume designer who sketched Monroe’s iconic dress just months before she died.
“[Marilyn] was a goddess. A crazy goddess, but a goddess. She was just fabulous. Nobody photographs like that. And it was done for her. It was designed for her,” he told Entertainment Weekly in May of the dress. “Nobody else should be seen in that dress.”
Fully expecting that backlash, Kardashian recently cleared up her motives behind borrowing the sultry getup.
“I love that Marilyn was a normal girl that figured it out and became the most famous woman in the entire world,” she said of the late actor’s legacy. “It’s just fascinating.”
“That sounds like someone we know,” a producer then said off-camera, to which Kardashian coyly replied: “Who?”
“The Kardashians” airs new episodes every Thursday on Hulu.