Princess Leia’s ‘slave girl bikini’ sells for $235,000 at online auction

It was the itsy-bitsy, gold bikini that sent millions of prepubescent boys, teenagers and adult nerds swooning.

Now, it’s proving to be a smart investment.

The “slave girl bikini” costume worn by the actress Carrie Fisher in a scene in The Return Of The Jedi – the third part in the original Star Wars trilogy – sold for US$175,000 (S$235,000) at an online auction on July 26.

That marked a near doubling in price from when the movie costume was last put up for sale in 2015, when it went for as much as US$96,000.

The costume – which includes plates, hip rings, an armlet and a bracelet – has become one of the most sought after Hollywood memorabilia because it features prominently in a movie franchise that continues to rake in millions for its creator, George Lucas, and entertainment behemoth Disney.

For Star Wars fans, it marked a pivot for the character that Fisher played – from a thoroughly covered, prude princess with the big, round hair buns to a skimpily clad, alluring slave girl with menacing pulled-back hair.

The scene in the 1983 movie where Fisher wore it had her iconic character – Princess Leia Organa – pretending to be a slave girl to infiltrate the lair of the warlord Jabba the Hutt. She eventually killed Jabba with the same chain that tied her to him.

The costume had been part of the collection of Mr Richard Miller, a sculptor and jeweller who designed it for Lucas. Mr Miller died in 2022.

The slave girl bikini was among the Star Wars memorabilia auctioned off by Heritage Auctions, which bills itself as the world’s largest auctioneer of collectible items.

A prop from the 1977 film Star Wars: A New Hope – a Y-wing starfighter – was sold for US$1.5 million, making it the second most expensive collectible item from the Star Wars franchise.

A complete R2-D2 unit used in the series sold for US$2.3 million in 2017.