This memoir of the life and career of Ray Diffen, stage costumer extraordinaire, is now available for sale online, through bookstores, and is downloadable for free on this site.

Click here for information about ordering the book.

Click here to download the newly revised .pdf of the book, with color pictures.

Below, Ray remembers Elizabeth Taylor when accepting the first annual Irene Sharaff Benchmark Award on the evening of March 22, 1999. Check Ray's Page for exciting news relating to this story!

From Ray Diffen Stage Clothes

"Whilst working one day with Sharaff, she asked us quietly if we would make a wedding dress for Elizabeth Taylor! Elizabeth was currently in Toronto where Richard Burton was opening in a new production of Hamlet, directed by John Gielgud. Richard and Elizabeth had taken the top floor of a hotel in Toronto with their entourage of assistants and dogs. They were looking for someone to marry them! Irene Sharaff had submitted four wedding dress designs to Elizabeth and she had picked one of them. It was yellow! As she had been married four times before, this was the only bridal colour that she had not used....

Sharaff had asked me to take samples of green ribbon to tie in the braid of her hair and to snip off a lock of her hair for Ronnie de Mann to match to a hairpiece! The ribbons were to be matched to an emerald brooch Richard had given to Elizabeth that she would wear with her yellow dress. We were met at the Toronto airport by Richard Maney and duly arrived at the hotel for the fitting. When we entered the suite, Miss Taylor, in a dressing gown, holding her beautiful head in her hands, was sitting on the bed.  She said she had a hangover! We started the fitting, talked about shoes, which had to be dyed to match. I snipped a small piece of her hair which I slipped into an envelope and then I asked if I could see the emerald brooch to match the ribbon samples.  Richard Maney went down to the hotel lobby where her jewels were kept in the hotel safe and came back to the suite with a large carpet bag, containing several million dollars worth of jewellery. Richard Maney gave the bag to Elizabeth who opened it, reached for a black velvet bag and withdrew the brooch. She then rubbed it on her backside, to shine it up and handed it to me. It was an oblong emerald; an inch square, surrounded by diamonds the size of peas. Exquisite!  I had to match the colour of this beautiful brooch to a piece of half-inch satin ribbon which was about 50 cents a yard!"