Daisy Fellowes
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Marguerite Séverine Philippine Decazes de Glücksbierg (29 April 1890-13 December 1962), better known as Daisy Fellowes, was a celebrated 20th-century society figure, acclaimed beauty, minor novelist and poet, erstwhile editor of Harpers Bazaar, fashion icon, and an heiress to the Singer sewing machine fortune.
She was the only daughter of Isabelle-Blanche Singer (1869-1896), who committed suicide, and Jean Elie Octave Louis Sévère Amanieu Decazes (1864-1912), 3rd duc Decazes et Glücksbierg. Her maternal grandfather was Isaac Merritt Singer, the American sewing-machine pioneer, and she was largely raised by her mother's elder sister, Winnaretta Singer, Princess Edmond de Polignac, a noted patron of the arts, particularly music.
Her first husband, whom she married on 10 May 1910, was Prince Jean Amédée Marie Anatole de Broglie, whom she reportedly caught in bed with the family's chauffeur. He died of influenza in 1918 while serving with the French Army in Algeria, though malicious observers gossiped that he actually committed suicide as a result of his homosexuality having been exposed. They had three daughters: Princess Emmeline Isabelle Edmée Séverine de Broglie (later Countess de Castéja), Princess Isabelle de Broglie (a novelist who married and divorced the Marquis de La Moussaye), and Princess Jacqueline de Broglie (former wife of Alfred Kraus). Of her Broglie children, the notoriously caustic Daisy once said, "The eldest is like her father, only more masculine. The second is like me, only without the guts. And the last is by some horrible little man called Lischmann."
Her second husband, whom she married on 9 August 1919, was Hon. Reginald Ailwyn Fellowes (1884-1953), a banker cousin of Winston Churchill and a grandson of a duke of Marlborough. They had one daughter, Rosamond Daisy Fellowes (b. 1921) who has been twice married.
Among her lovers was Duff Cooper, the British ambassador to France.
Fellowes wrote several novels and at least one epic poem. Her best-known work is Les dimanches de la Comtesse de Narbonne (1931, published in English as "Sundays").
She also was known as one of the most daring fashion plates of the 20th century, arguably the most important patron of the surrealist couturier Elsa Schiaparelli. de:Daisy Fellowes
External Links
For the genealogy of the Broglie family (Daisy's first husband) see here (http://pages.prodigy.net/ptheroff/gotha/broglie.html/) For information about Daisy's youngest daughter, see here (http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~conqueror/genealogy_html/i356.html#i18229/)
For images of Daisy Fellowes, see \this photo (http://www.canadianinteriordesign.com/kwi/Daisey.htm) and \these photos, mostly by Beaton (http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp65547).
An article (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2003/10/24/baschiap20.xml&sSheet=/arts/2003/10/24/ixartright.html\) about Daisy's favorite designer, Schiaparelli and her two favorite clients, the Duchess of Windsor and Daisy Fellowes.