This prominent socialite and fashion icon served as Vogue magazine's fashion Editor during the late 1930s and 1940s and was named by Time magazine as one of the world's best-dressed women. In the late 1950s, she was inducted into the International Fashion Hall of Fame.
Born Barbara Cushing, she grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, as the daughter of Katharine Stone Crowell Cushing and prominent surgeon Harvey Cushing. Her sister Minnie married Vincent Astor and her sister Betsey wed the son of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
She was a close friend of author Truman Capote.
Her second marriage, to Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) executive william S. Paley, resulted in a daughter named Kate and a son named william. Her other daughter and son, Amanda and Stanley, were the children of her first husband, Stanley Grafton Mortimer, Jr.
She and fellow socialite Wallis Simpson were both included on Time magazine's 1941 best-dressed list.
