In Exodus 25:2-9, God commands Moses to take an offering for a sanctuary from "...everyone who gives willingly with his heart..." In the list of things to be taken were "...blue, purple, and scarlet thread..." (v. 2).
Hebrew for blue, te-kā'-leth refers to the molluscs from which the the dye itself was extracted, especially the species helix ianthina according to "Gesenius' Hebrew Chaldea Lexicon to the Old Testament" (Strong's H8504). These molluscs were found in the Mediterranean Sea, and were harvested for the dyes that they possessed. Obtaining the dyes was a tedious and time consuming task, as the small molluscs had to be found, harvested, and processed, yielding if but a few drops(?). The "cost to yield" ratio would bring the price too high for anyone other than the wealthy to afford. This, as far as I can determine, is why the color purple represents wealth and or royalty to date. The "blue" in the context here was not as the modern day indigo, but a shade of purple distinguishably lighter than that of the "purple" mentioned in the same passage.
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