Fashion designer and socialite Jacqueline, Comtesse de Ribes, died on Dec. 30. She was 96. Born in Paris to the Comte de Beaumont, she married Édouard, Comte de Ribes, in 1948. She designed clothing beginning in the 1950s, and soon both show-biz royalty and real royalty were her customers (de Ribes signed an exclusive contract with Saks in 1985). She also produced French TV shows, and was manager at the International Ballet of the Marquis de Cuevas, and supported several museums, humanitarian and environmental causes. De Ribes told Suzy Menkes, “When I went on my first trip to America in 1952, I met Oleg Cassini. We discussed fashion and he liked the way I dressed. At that time I had only two or three haute couture pieces and the other things I'd done by myself. And he said, ‘Jacqueline, could you work for me in Paris?’ I said yes and transformed part of the attic into an atelier.”
