Is That Dress White and Gold or Blue and Black? The New York Times 10 years ago, a simple photograph of a dress sparked a global debate unlike anything seen online before. Posted in 2015, the image caused people to argue intensely over whether the dress Dressgate: If you saw THAT dress as white your brain was working overtime This explains how the blue black white gold dress illusion was possible. But it doesn't explain why some people saw it one way and some saw it the other, and no one seemed to see