Get ready for the garage sale of the century. Princess Diana has selected 80 shimmery, sexy ball gowns and cocktail dresses to be publicly sold at Cristie's auction house with all proceeds donated to charity. The auction will take place in New York June 25 after the dresses are exhibited in London.

The dazzling frocks were all worn between 1981 and 1996 and include the blue silk-velvet gown Diana wore to the White House in 1985 when she danced with John Travolta and the lilac silk crepe dress she donned at the last official trip she made with Prince Charles in 1992 in South Korea. Diana divorced Britain's future king last August.

Most of the dresses were created by British designers such as Catherine Walker, Zandra Rhodes, Bruce Oldfield and Victor Edelstein. The big, puffy, ivory, fairy-tale wedding dress Diana wore in 1981 is not for sale. Experts estimate the auction could raise more than $1.65 million for the AIDS Crisis Trust and the Royal Marsden hospital for cancer patients in London, two of Diana's favorite charities.

But it's hard to put a price on an empress' old clothes. "Members of the royal family have given dresses to their friends...but they have never actually sold them before," said Meredith Etherington-Smith, Cristie's marketing director. "You just can't estimate how much money people will be prepared to pay. These dresses have a sort of magic about them."

In a statement, Diana said she is "extremely happy to have this wonderful opportunity to raise money for charities." On Monday, she filed suit against the Express on Sunday, a London weekly newspaper, for writing that she would personally profit from the auction. Her recent divorce settlement from Charles forbids her from using her position to make commercial deals.