The Morbid Way Kelly Ripa Prepped Hubby Mark Consuelos For Her Eventual Death

Kelly Ripa's closet is awe-inspiring. The fashion icon has dresses and various outfits from three decades ago that will most definitely come back into style someday, or at least they hopefully will, according to her husband, Mark Consuelos, who jokingly calls Ripa a clothes hoarder. The talk show host likely even still has her off-the-rack wedding dress tucked away somewhere in the depths of her wardrobe. But there's one thing hanging in there that isn't as fun as throwback pieces or as light-hearted as her signature pink looks: Ripa's funeral attire.

Speaking to the audience of "Live! With Kelly and Mark" in January 2024, the "All My Children" alum revealed that she had already picked out what she wanted to wear to her own funeral. More than that, she has shared her postmortem outfit with her hubby so he doesn't have to guess what she wants to wear and potentially get it wrong. "Let me remind you where the outfit hangs. It is labeled and Lauren knows about it. It's a Dolce & Gabbana black dress. It's 10 years old. It's elegant, it's gorgeous, it's black, it's adorable," she detailed (via People).

The Lauren in question is likely Lauren Travaglione, Ripa's longtime personal assistant, whom she jokingly refers to as her chief of staff. With instructions as explicit as those handed down to more than one person, it's abundantly clear that the "Hope & Faith" star takes her funeral, and her attire, very seriously.

Kelly Ripa hasn't left very much to chance when planning her own celebration of life. She admitted on air, per People, to being "fearful if he [Mark Consuelos] has to eulogize" her because that is one thing she has not scripted, and probably can't, logically speaking. However, everything else is all set. "First of all, at the funeral, it'll be a buffet of all my least-favorite things," Ripa began, "It'll be deviled eggs, it'll be chicken wings, it'll be glasses of milk." But Consuelos looked a little taken aback. "Hey, watch out because I'm going to have to dress you as well," he admonished his wife before Ripa reminded him of her little black dress.

The talk show host has a good reason for purchasing her funeral attire ahead of time. In 2022, she shared on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" that once, after she passed out at home while romantically entangled with Consuelos, her husband called 911 and needed to dress her before the paramedics arrived. Consuelos chose a green ballet leotard, his own black soccer pants with the snaps down the side (throwback tear-off style), and red patent leather platform heels — to say she was embarrassed was an understatement. Ripa recalled the story on "Live!" in 2016, explaining how she hid beneath the stretcher sheet in shame.

Fortunately, should another emergency happen, we have no doubt that Ripa has an entire outfit ready to go just so she doesn't end up in the same situation. 

When Mark Consuelos picked Kelly Ripa's outfit that likely gave the paramedics quite a laugh, the former soap star acknowledged she was ashamed. However, Ripa has handled other fashion emergencies with grace and humor. While sporting her signature pink dress on "Live!" in April 2023, Ripa accidentally tore the ensemble while learning how to dance with guests Val Chmerkovskiy and Jenna Johnson, from "Dancing With the Stars." 

She was following the moves with Consuelos when she suddenly blurted out, "Did my entire back of my dress rip open?" before collapsing into a fit of laughter. Ripa then joked with viewers, "It's just a breakaway dress! Who cares!" (via Entertainment Tonight). A month later, in May 2023, the exact same dress gave her some more trouble when the front seemed to malfunction, causing her to be nearly late for her entrance. 

Meanwhile, a concerned Consuelous was almost forced to come up with ways to stall while they waited for her. The TV star graciously laughed it off, though, while proving that she truly does recycle everything in her closet. Thankfully, we haven't seen Ripa even once in her black D&G number because that sounds like it's one outfit she won't be recycling. For now, it waits unworn in her closet, specifically set aside for her funeral.