Paul Allen’s secret stash: 4K new pop culture treasures coming to MoPOP

What do Darth Vader’s helmet, an annotated Star Trek script from 1965, and the alien creature suit from the film "Alien" have in common?

Those are just three of the items pop-culture enthusiast, and Microsoft cofounder, Paul Allen collected over the years. Now, his estate is donating them to the Museum of Pop Culture, aka MoPOP.

The late Paul G. Allen was also cofounder of MoPOP and an avid collector of art and pop culture memorabilia. This most recent donation of artifacts to the museum by Allen’s estate includes over 4,000 pieces.

“There's the 1951 Epiphone FT 79 acoustic guitar owned by Jimi Hendrix,” said Michele Y. Smith, CEO of MoPOP. “And we have heard that this is where he would work out all of his tunes.”

Smith gave a sneak peak into some of the rare items in this collection that have never been on public exhibit before.

“We also have some things from Prince, from 'Purple Rain' from when he was riding the bike and some of his costumes,” Smith said, mentioning the jacket Prince wore in the 1984 film.

Additional notable items in this new collection are the iconic hat worn by Margaret Hamilton as the Wicked Witch of the West in the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz”, a hand-painted and smashed Univox electric guitar owned by Kurt Cobain, and hand-written lyrics by David Bowie for “Starman” from the early 1970s.

MoPop has not not announced when all of the new items will be on display, but Smith says some of the new pieces will be on exhibit in 2024.