WASHINGTON (AFP) ― The first thing you notice when you see Marilyn Monroe’s full-length gloves in the storeroom of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History is how small her hands were.

“They’re one of a number of pairs she had,” says curator Dwight Bowers, gently lifting them out of the beige steel cabinet they share with Christopher Reeves’ Superman costume and the 10-gallon hat that J.R. wore in “Dallas.”

“They’re white kid. They’re very tiny and petite. And they show the decorousness of the 1950s,” he explained. “There’s a stain of ink on the left one ... perhaps it came from giving an autograph to someone.”

Donated by a private collector, the gloves make up the entire Marilyn Monroe collection at the publicly-funded Smithsonian Institution, the world’s largest network of museums and, in principle, repository of all things Americana.

Bowers, who plans to include the gloves in an forthcoming Smithsonian exhibition on American popular culture, said it’s “logical” for the museum to hold more Monroe memorabilia.

“But Hollywood material and Hollywood celebrities are big business in the auction world,” he told AFP in the windowless storeroom that’s packed floor to ceiling with show-business artifacts from vaudeville to today.

“Private collectors are part of our competition ― and private collectors have a much bigger budget than we have.”

Fifty years after her death, demand for anything related to Hollywood’s original blonde bombshell ― from the dresses she wore to the magazine covers she graced ― is stronger than ever. And it’s more global as well.

Many choice items can be seen at the Hollywood Museum in Los Angeles, where a handful of private collectors have pooled their most prized Monroe objects for a summer-long public exhibition.

It’s a wide-ranging show, from the mortgage paperwork on Monroe’s house to never-before-seen photographs and a host of garments like the black silk crepe dress she wore on her honeymoon with baseball legend Joe DiMaggio.

“It had been in storage for 35 years,” Hollywood Museum founder Donelle Dadigan said. “When we received it, you knew who it belonged to, because the Chanel Number Five perfume still lingered ... It was almost magical.”