Dolly Parton Was Modest to an ‘Unusual’ Degree, Said Her Friends
When imagining Dolly Parton, the first word that comes to mind likely isn’t “modest.” The singer favors tight, revealing clothing, bright makeup, and towering wigs. According to those who knew her, though, Parton took modesty seriously. Her friends said that though Parton dressed a certain way, she was modest when it came to her body.
Dolly Parton was surprisingly modest, according to her friends
When Parton began to appear on The Porter Wagoner Show, she turned to seamstress Judy Hunt and designer Lucy Adams to build her a custom wardrobe. These women got to know Parton’s measurements well, but they never saw her body.
“She’s V-E-R-Y modest, yes sir!” Hunt said in the book Dolly by Alanna Nash. “I mean she’ll turn that back! Go off in another room! You’re not gonna see her with no clothes on. Now, you can see her in her pantyhose, but not in just her underpants or without a bra. She won’t even walk around in a bra. That’s kind of unusual.”
Adams said she turned her back every time Parton got dressed. When the singer had her outfit fully on, Adams would then turn back to her to zip her up.
“Dolly’s one of the most modest people I’ve ever met in my life,” makeup artist Jo Coulter said. “When we taped the old Porter Wagoner shows at WSM, she’d go in the little tee-iny bathroom, which was like two-foot square, to change into her costume. She wouldn’t change out in the big room, even though she knew there would be no men coming in, because that was the ladies’ restroom, where we did our makeup. But she would never change in front of anybody.”
Dolly Parton took modesty into consideration when picking her outfits for concerts
While Parton’s clothing grew more revealing over the years, she kept modesty in mind while picking outfits for touring. For this reason, she typically wore pantsuits when she performed.
“My things weren’t as wild to start with in all the styles, but we gradually built up more and more to where she’d say, ‘I’d like them crusted.’ Just crusted with rhinestones,” Adams said. “Then we came up with the big wide-bottomed legs on her pants. She’d wear long dresses for conventions and special occasions, and she’d wear some short dresses, too. But she found the pantsuits more practical for the stage, for modesty’s sake. From then on, just about all of her stage things were pantsuits or jumpsuits, and I just kept getting them wider and wider at the bottom.”
She still liked to accentuate her body with her clothes
Though Parton didn’t want anyone to see her without clothes, she liked her outfits to accentuate her figure. She requested that Adams make her very form-fitting costumes.
“If she could reach down and pick it up, it was too loose,” Adams said. “If she’d left it up to me, I wouldn’t have done that. Sometimes I’d make things and think they fit real nice, but she’d say they were too big, for me to take them up more. It looked like it would be uncomfortable, but I’d just push her in and zip her up. That’s the way she wanted it.”
Still, Parton initially requested high-necked tops to cover up her chest.
