The Comtesse Jean de Polignac was the daughter of Jeanne Lanvin and invariably wore her mother's clothes. According to Bettina Ballard, she was a "soft beauty" who belonged more to the intimacy of the private salon than to public places of entertainment. As she observed, "She was one of the few fashionable women who never changed her style, her wavy blonde hair worn in a feminine bun, her soft fabric dresses cut with no definite lines." The Comtesse belonged just as much to the music world as she did to the fashion world. Janet Flanner commented, "She had a voice like a well-trained lark." With the musiologist Nadia Boulanger, she staged Sunday evening concerts at her mother's house. Salvador Dalí wrote in My Secret Life, "In spring it was very pleasant at Comtesse Marie-Blanche de Polignac's, where from the garden one listened to string quartets played in the interior, all aflame with candles and the Renoir paintings."

BACK TO TOP