As the oldest child of the Count and Countess Jean de Beaumont, Countess Jacqueline de Ribes grew up with the fortune her father had built for the Rivaud Group, which, founded in 1910, held interests in rubber, banana, and palm-oil plantations in Africa, Indonesia, and Indochina.

Lanky and graceful, de Ribes would go on to be compared by the designer Yves Saint Laurent to “an ivory unicorn,” be referred by the Prince Nicolas Dadeshkeliani as “the de Gaulle of fashion,” and be dubbed by Valentino as “The Last Queen of Paris.” In 1999, Jean Paul Gaultier even dedicated his haute couture collection to her by titling it “Divine Jacqueline.”