It’s been 10 years since a single question tore the internet in two: blue and black or white and gold? We’re talking, of course, about The Dress.
On February 26, 2015, a poorly lit photograph of an ambiguously hued, two-toned lace dress left social media in tatters. Was it blue and black? Gold and white? Scientists have since confirmed it’s the former, but at the time—and even now—millions swore otherwise.
Unlike so many viral memes with cloudy origins, we know exactly who to thank for this one: Automattic’s very own Cates Holderness.
Cates, now editorial and marketing lead at Tumblr, was responsible for one of the biggest viral moments ever—even if the book may never fully close on those colors.
Let’s go back to that fateful day. Cates, then the community manager at BuzzFeed who was running the brand’s Tumblr account, received a Tumblr message and a corresponding post containing the now-infamous photo. Caitlin McNeill, a Scottish musician, had performed at a family friend’s wedding where the photo—taken by the bride’s mother—first made the rounds. “Some people see it blue, some see it white,” she wrote. “We are goING CRAZY.”
Cates showed the Tumblr post to her coworkers at BuzzFeed’s New York office. She saw blue and black, but others saw white and gold. Within minutes, a crowd had formed at her desk.
As you know by now, this was just the beginning.
Cates reposted McNeill’s query onto her own Tumblr and X (then Twitter, RIP), and created a BuzzFeed poll titled “What Colors Are This Dress?” Before leaving work, the Tumblr post had 5,000 notes. When she emerged from the subway in Brooklyn and regained internet access, her phone crashed from the deluge of notifications. There would be more than 7.6 million tweets, and the poll would be seen by more than 38 million people. The Dress had gone viral.
The debate raged for months. On Twitter, Kim Kardashian and Taylor Swift weighed in, with hashtags like #whiteandgold, #blueandblack, and #dressgate dominating the platform. Serious media outlets analyzed the optical illusion and what it said about visual perception, making it nearly impossible to escape. If there were a Criterion Collection for memes, The Dress would arguably be Citizen Kane—or, at the very least, The Devil Wears Prada.
A decade later, the legacy continues. The Dress has an extensive Wikipedia page, which appears at the top of the Google results for the phrase “the dress.” Cates was recently a Pop Culture Jeopardy! clue, and even appeared on The Today Show last week in honor of the milestone.
The Dress now stands as the (white and) gold standard for internet memes. Even today, trends are measured against it. Is Holding Space as big as The Dress? What about The Rizzler? The answer is usually no, but only time will tell.
The Dress also represents a relic of a bygone internet: It was one of the last moments that captivated every online platform and every demographic at once, all in a matter of hours. In today’s fractured digital landscape, it’s hard not to be nostalgic about a meme taking over just like that, amusing and perhaps enraging us, and then fading away—no short-lived celebrities, deep discourse, or anything remotely close to a “Dress-coin” involved.
To celebrate the big Dressiversary, Cates reflected on the moment’s impact and lasting relevance. Watch our exclusive video interview above, and long live The Dress!
Automattic 