The Vicomtesse of the Bizarre

Marie-Laure de Noailles, Vicomtesse de Noailles was one of the 20th century's most daring and influential patrons of the arts, noted for her associations with Salvador Dalí, Balthus, Jean Cocteau, Man Ray, Luis Buñuel, Francis Poulenc, Jean Hugo, Jean-Michel Frank and others as well as her tempestuous life and eccentric personality. She and her husband financed Ray's film Les Mystères du Château de Dé (1929), Poulenc's Aubade (1929), Buñuel and Dalí's film L'Âge d'Or (1930), and Cocteau's The Blood of a Poet (1930).

Marie-Laure de Noailles and her husband lived in the fabled hôtel particulier at 11 Place des États-Unis in Paris, which was built by her grandfather Bischoffsheim. Its interiors were redecorated in the 1920s by French minimalist designer Jean-Michel Frank. The house is now the Musée Baccarat and the headquarters of Baccarat, the crystal company.

Ski High Altitude Society

Gstaad, in Switzerland, is perhaps more famous for its international high society than for it’s skiing. It’s located in the German-speaking section of the Canton of Berne in the southwestern part of the country. Valentino has a house there, as did the Buckley’s. King Juan Carlos of Spain famously broke his pelvis there. He broke it skiing.

Cortina, or more precisely Cortina d'Ampezzo, nestled in the Dolomites in the Italian Alps, is another famous ski destination known for its après-ski scene. The town hosted the 1956 Winter Olympics and was used in a scene from the James Bond picture, For Your Eyes Only.

St. Moritz, in Switzerland, is arguably more famous, if a bit more common. One of the oldest ski resorts in Europe, it hosted the Winter Olympics in both 1928 and 1948. It is also home to the Cartier Polo World Cup on Snow; an annual high-goal tournament featuring many of the world's finest teams. The tournament lasts four days and is played on a specially marked field located on a frozen lake.

Megève, in France, started its development as a ski resort in the 1910s when the Rothschild family started to spend their winter vacations there after becoming disenchanted with St. Moritz. In 1921, Baronne Noémie de Rothschild opened a hotel which boosted the resort's development. By the 1950s Megève was one of the most popular ski resorts in Europe, and was featured in the opening scenes of Charade with Audrey Hepburn, where her character meets Cary Grant.

The Beau of the Ball

Charles de Beistegui was an eccentric multi-millionaire art collector and interior decorator and one of the most flamboyant characters of mid-20th century European life, whose passport was Spanish and whose wealth came from his family's Mexican silver mines. The cash reservoir allowed de Beistegui to indulge himself in the homes he decorated, such as his Chateau de Groussay and the 17th century Palace Labia in Venice.

In 1951 Beistegui held a masked costume ball in Venice, which he called Le Bal Oriental. It was one of the last truly spectacular events in that famous palazzo, and it was one of the largest and most lavish social events of the 20th century. The truly upper crust of international society attended in costumes custom made for the event. The host wore scarlet robes and a long curling wig, and his normal height was raised a full 16 inches by platform soles. Cecil Beaton's photographs of the ball display an almost surreal society, reminiscent of Venetian life immediately before the fall of the republic at the end of the 18th century.