Aimée de Heeren (1903-2006) wearing the necklace of the French Crown
The 4 Duchesses of Westminster
History of the Jewels of France
more information: Palace Hotels of the World
back ... history of the French Crown
The purchases of Prince Albert von Thurn und Taxis
1885 At the age of 18, Albert von Thurn und Taxis (1867-1952) inherited one of the most substantial fortunes in the world, almost as large as that of the Duke of Westminster. In 1490 his ancestor Franz Taxis had founded a Postal Service that stretched from Italy to the Benelux. His mother, Princess Helene von Thurn und Taxis, was the elder sister of Empress Sissi of Austria and a cousin of King Ludwig II of Bavaria (of castle fame).
1890 Albert Thurn und Taxis was looking for a wedding present for his future wife, Archduchess Margarete of Austria. His former teacher whispered to him that "Margarete" means "pearl" in Greek and Latin. (In Bavaria, children still learn Greek and Latin in many secondary schools today.)
Diadem of Empress Eugénie
Alexandre-Gabriel Lemonnier
Diadem of Empress Eugénie
Alexandre-Gabriel Lemonnier
Diadem of Empress Eugénie
Alexandre-Gabriel Lemonnier
Diadem of Empress Eugénie
Alexandre-Gabriel Lemonnier
So he set off in search of pearls. On the advice of his aunt, Empress Sissi of Austria, he went to Paris to the jeweller Julius Jacoby (which at the time was a rather secret address). It was there that he bought the Empress's diadem, some of whose pearls, according to his grandson Johannes, had already been among the jewels of Louis XIV.
1930s Albert von Thurn und Taxis loved telling anecdotes to his many grandchildren, including Princes Anselm and Johannes, seen in this photo.
And sometimes he told anecdotes about Bendor, the 2nd Duke of Westminster, and his utterly incredible gifts ... which hugely amused the young boys. Their favourite story was that of Mademoiselle Chanel's fits of rage, when she would throw the precious gifts into the sea .... that story had to be told over and over again, hundreds and hundreds of times.
Prince Anselm Thurn und Taxis was the presumed sole heir to the fortune, but he died during the Second World War, and so the fortune passed to his cousin Johannes.
1952 On the death of his grandfather, Johannes inherited the immense Thurn und Taxis fortune at the age of 26. This photo shows him around 1960 at the Oktoberfest (the Munich Beer Festival) with Princess Soraya Esfandiary, who took the photo at the top of this article.
As chance would have it, 40 years later she came to take internet lessons at the Cremerie de Paris, from where the Hotel Carlton.fr website is published. And one day she brought this little souvenir photo as a gift. Soraya was not the best "internet pupil", but she was very witty and very funny.
1986 A ball was given for the 60th birthday of Johannes Thurn und Taxis; his wife Gloria (only 25) wore the diadem as she sang in the opera Don Giovanni ... and who should be among the guests who had come from all over the world???
The woman who had walked out of the lobby of the Hotel Carlton with flowers on her head ... 47 years earlier, and this time, instead of exotic flowers, a wig in the style of the Ball and earrings given to her by Bendor.
The editor of this article knows full well whom he is talking about, for he was there too, still somewhat dumbfounded by all those jewels, the like of which he had never seen before that event.
... and still miles away from imagining all the legends that surrounded Aimée de Heeren.
Johannes von Thurn und Taxis and Aimée de Heeren would talk for hours and hours; they had absolutely incredible stories about practically all the major figures of the 20th century, whom they knew personally and some of whom were present at that birthday celebration.
And they had someone listening to them like a vacuum cleaner, recording everything without always quite understanding, there were so many kings, presidents, inventors, Marilyn Monroe, people so distant who had invented the telephone or the electric light bulb, even someone who had walked on the moon. And they enjoyed having a young man beside them who was fascinated by their conversations; friendships were formed that lasted until death.
The talk was often of jewels, of a Paris count who had had extraordinary necklaces seized by customs two Saturdays in a row, of an Elizabeth Taylor, with even more diamonds when seen in person, being the nightmare of hotel managers. If only the editor had taken more notes ...
Johannes Thurn und Taxis was extremely cultured and, through his grandmother, was related several times over to Louis XIV, whose history he knew so well that it was as if the king himself were taking part in the conversations.
And he was fascinated by this Aimée, of whom he would say, laughing: "People always think I have an extraordinary collection, and it did take 500 years to build, but Aimée's is far more spectacular still, and it came together in just a few years without her ever needing to spend a penny".
This photo, taken in December 1989, shows 4 brooches of Empress Eugénie: an emerald brooch on Aimée de Heeren and three sapphire brooches on Gloria von Thurn und Taxis.
But how did Aimée come by all these jewels without spending a penny?
She cannot possibly have inherited them from her father, who was a schoolteacher, highly educated and very literary, but not at all wealthy. Aimée and her sister Vera grew up in a small town in Brazil, Castro, in the State of Paraná?
The purchases of the Duke of Westminster
1899, a young man of 21 in England inherited from his grandfather one of the greatest fortunes in the world. Over the years he developed a taste for jewellery, which he gave to every woman he found beautiful who crossed his path. This was Hugh Richard Grosvenor, the 2nd Duke of Westminster. Those in the know called him Bend'or (1879-1953).
What is not a hypothesis, however, is that Bendor himself, the 2nd Duke of Westminster, had made the acquaintance in 1939 of Aimée de Heeren, who promptly slipped away from him because, owing to the war, she emigrated to the United States.
Aimée was no ordinary exceptionally beautiful woman. Bendor wanted to find her again, but by the time she was finally located in her Park Avenue apartment, which she shared with her sister Vera Prettyman, it was already too late. Having arrived in New York like a bombshell, she had already found a new boyfriend who, alas, although far less wealthy than Bendor, was, thanks to his youth at 24, more handsome than Bendor, who was already 61. What is more, he had a future pointing towards the White House.
Bendor was not very happy in his marriage to the 3rd Duchess of Westminster. And one day a rather far-fetched idea crossed his mind.
He was in the habit of giving jewellery, but to this woman who had slipped away from him he wanted to give jewels that were "out of the ordinary". He knew she was interested in the life of Empress Eugénie. A jewel that had belonged to the Empress would surely impress her ...
Tracking down the French Crown Jewels was a treasure hunt that held the Duke of Westminster spellbound. And it was a most complicated hunt, for some of the treasures, such as the large parures, had been reworked into brooches and assorted jewels.
Bendor's finds were the most incredible of all, for they included both jewels from the sales of 1872 and 1887 and jewels that had left the collection a century earlier, during and just after the French Revolution.
Grace Kelly, a friend of Aimée de Heeren – who was astounded by the magnitude of the jewels – once asked her
"How can you accept such enormous presents from a man who is not your husband?"
and she replied,
"You know, Bendor is like a child, he loves to make his friends happy – he spent months finding this jewel that once belonged to the Empress Eugénie. He absolutely wants me to wear it; he would be far too sad if I refused.".
The publisher of this site often had the opportunity to see these gifts from Bendor. The Crown Jewels were Aimée's greatest joy, and it was Bendor's wish that she should wear them and never, for anything in the world, sell them.
The most beautiful gift was the last. The author of this article was lucky enough to hold it in his hand on two occasions. The gift had a quite incredible brilliance but, alas, as so often, he did not realise the exceptional historical importance of the object he was holding.
Aimée never sold a single jewel. Her collection was one of the most secret and most important jewellery collections in the world. And in a sense the most fascinating collection, for nowhere else were there so many jewels from the French Crown, from the Brazilian Crown and from American history, and nowhere else so many love stories attached to each piece.
How did the Duke of Westminster manage to find these jewels?
Aimée sometimes wondered: how on earth did Bendor manage to find all these untraceable jewels that had belonged to the French Crown? It is quite rare for such jewels to turn up at auction. Bendor's purchases were probably almost all made through "private transactions". But how did Bendor manage to locate them?
It is doubtful that the Carlton's concierge could have helped him. The Duke probably had to hire someone to carry out research, which was far less easy before the internet. Then he must have sought advice from specialists, such as a renowned jeweller like Louis or Pierre Cartier. But he must also have gone through an expert unknown to the general public.
Aimée had often heard of a young art dealer, Stéphane Binet, who, behind a very discreet stand at Serpette (the Paris flea market), possesses unique knowledge and connections. She would have turned to him had she ever wished to sell a ring very discreetly to someone such as the Sheikha of Qatar, or to the Louvre, whose royal display case in the Galerie d'Apollon is so modest compared with her own collection – apart from the crowns and the diadem, which Aimée could hardly have worn to a cocktail party.
Selling a jewel through him might perhaps have made "less noise" than going through her long-standing friend Christopher Balfour of Christie's, or Alfred Taubman of Sotheby's, who invited her to every one of his birthdays. Sometimes the most important works of art change hands without anyone knowing. But make no mistake: never, not for anything in the world, would Aimée have sold a jewel, and there was nothing she loathed more than "clingy" people who sought to exploit a supposed friendship to have her entrust them with an antique – or, worse still, a jewel – to sell.
As for Stéphane Binet, Lady Di found "My gosh, this guy is so incredibly cute, still so young, so Hollywood, but he should lose some weight" ... What is rather comical is that the art dealer himself did not know that the Princess had observed him without his noticing, nor that he sometimes featured in her conversations without being aware of it. Well, that is a "magic connection" – it is hard to explain, for it lies beyond the rational, rather like certain pearls in tiaras that have passed down through history: a very discreet stand at the flea market, no network marketing, and the most inaccessible people come of their own accord.
To return to the question of how the Duke of Westminster acquired these treasures, he too must certainly have had a "magic connection" to unearth such objects, but finding out today, in 2013, who "that person" was ... is no easy matter.
And so these doubtless fascinating stories of the "hunt for the French Crown Jewels" must have been lost, for want of anyone, anywhere, having written them down – as the site on one of the Savoy Hotels has done. In any case, these secrets are not to be found in the annals of the Grosvenor estate administration, unlike the records of Coco Chanel's salmon fishing, carefully preserved in leather-bound period ledgers.
Bendor did not wish to leave the whole of his colossal fortune to his cousin who, owing to somewhat strange rules of succession, was his principal heir in place of his own daughters and the 4th Duchess. Nor did he wish needlessly to stir up posthumous jealousy in the latter.
One would have to search through all kinds of visiting cards that may perhaps have survived in archives of Bendor's life (do such archives even exist??). But should you ever find a card of a most impractical size, with dark blue lettering on a white background – lettering you can feel as you run your finger over it – the whole edged with a Sony-orange border ... you will hold the key to one of the secrets of the jewels of the Kings of France.
If by some miracle you have a photo of this "business card", or if you have photos of Bendor, Aimée, Coco Chanel or a lost jewel of the French Crown, please send them to the Cremerie de Paris. It will make our article far more interesting.
more on the jewels ... Palace Hotels of the World
back ... to the start of the article on Bendor
Video on the British Crown Jewels
Video on the history of jewellery
Video on the history of jewellery
A few websites related to this article:
The exhibition centre Cremerie de Paris In the history of the Cremerie .... Aimée de Heeren, Bendor and Coco Chanel The history of Chanel by VB.com The story of Aimee de Heeren A site on the history of brands Very Beautiful = VB.com Palace Hotels of the World.com
Where the jewels belonging to the Louvre are kept: the Galerie d'Apollon An information site on the life of Napoleon III, husband of Empress Eugénie. Information site Thurn und Taxis.com