Dolores Guinness


Dolores Guinness was a German-born aristocrat, socialite, fashion icon, and jet set member of the 1950s and 1960s. She was a member of the International Best Dressed List from 1970. Her mother was the Mexican-born socialite Gloria Guinness.

Early life

She was born on 31 July 1936 in Berlin-Charlottenburg. She was the only daughter of Franz-Egon Maria Meinhard Engelbert Pius Aloysius Kaspar Ferdinand Dietrich, 3rd Graf von Fürstenberg-Herdringen and his second wife, Gloria Guinness . She also has a younger brother, Franz-Egon, and a half-sister, Betsy von Furstenberg, from her father's previous marriage.
Though some published sources have described Dolores von Fürstenberg as a countess and a princess, she would have been, in fact, a Freiin, according to the last published issue of the Almanach de Gotha - had these titles not been abolished in 1919.

Later life

At age 19, she married her stepbrother Patrick Benjamin Guinness, son of Loel Guinness and Joan Yarde-Buller, on 22 October 1955 in Paris. Patrick was killed in a car accident in Turtig near Raron, Switzerland 1965. Their children were:
  1. Maria Alexandra Guinness Cook married Foulques, Count de Quatrebarbes in 1979. Now divorced. Have issue.
  2. Loel Patrick Guinness
  3. Victoria Christina Niarchos married Philip Niarchos in 1984, son of late Greek billionaire Stavros Niarchos. Have issue.
After Patrick's death, Dolores fell madly in love with the Aga Khan, the son of Joan Barbara Yarde-Buller by her marriage to Aly Khan, and so her late husband's half-brother, and wanted to marry him, but nothing came of that.

Fashion icon

Dolores was often seen in Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Town and Country and Life magazine dressed in designer clothes from Givenchy, Christian Dior, Yves Saint Laurent and Balenciaga during the 1950s and 1960s, photographed by Cecil Beaton, Bert Stern, Henry Clarke, Mark Shaw, Richard Avedon and William Klein. She often appeared on the International Best Dressed List during these years.