British clothing retailer Roman Originals, who are selling the controversial lace creation for £50 ($77), "woke to chaos" Friday morning after the online world was torn asunder over the issue.

Ever since one Tumblr user posted a photo of the dress and asked the world "is this dress white and gold, or blue and black?" debate has been raging, and Ian Johnson, Roman Original's Creative Manager says the company sold out of the item within minutes.

"We went to bed and woke to chaos," he told Mashable. "We first heard about it from tweets on our iPads at four in the morning."

"We sold out within an hour and we've just managed to get more stock on," he added. "I don't have accurate numbers yet but we normally stock at least 300 of every item."

The dress is sold in 140 Roman Originals stores in the UK and in some concessions in Ireland. The next batch will be arriving in shops next week.

Importantly for half of the Internet, Johnson said his team are thinking about creating a gold and white version in addition to the other range of colours.

"We are thinking about making a gold and white version," he said. "We already do it in other colours. We could do it quickly, but it has to go through quality assurance."

So why has the dress garnered so much attention? "It's just one of those things," Johnson said. "People are always interested in a mystery. We haven't seen debate about colour like this before. We normally just get the usual customer service questions."

The Romans Original team are heading out to celebrate Friday night.

Mashable asked Johnson to settle the issue of the colour once and for all, but he wasn't much help.

"It’s open to interpretation but we like to think it’s blue and black."

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.