42 facts about Daphne Guinness

She is an heir by direct descent of Arthur Guinness, the 18th-century inventor of the beer that still bears his name. Learn 42 facts about Daphne Guinness.

1. At the request of Fashion Institute of Technology director Valerie Steele, she spent two years mounting an exhibition of a hundred displays of her clothing, which was staged within the context of her other projects, film and modeling.

2. She is courted by many of the best-known names in fashion (such as Karl Lagerfeld, NARS, MAC, Akris, Gareth Pugh and Philip Treacy), working with them artistically or as a model or both.

3. Her best-known friend was the late fashion designer Alexander McQueen. Scheduled to model for charity on the runway the day his suicide was announced, Guinness veiled herself in mourning.

4. She creates and invents many objects herself, many inspired by her fascination with armour.

5. She is known for a taste for skinny pants and platform pumps.

6. She designs fashion, jewelry, and perfume for herself when she cannot find exactly what she wants to wear or buy. She has said that she created more than 100 pieces in 2010 alone.

7. Since 1994, she has been on the International Best Dressed Hall of Fame, which seeks to identify the best-dressed women in the world.

8. In 2010, she was named in Tatler's top 10 best-dressed list.

9. In 2011, she created a make-up line for MAC cosmetics.

10. In January 2011, she was asked by Tom Ford to close his comeback womenswear show.

11. Her full name is Daphne Diana Joan Susanna Guinness.

12. She is an artist of both British and Irish nationality.

13. She is an heir by direct descent of Arthur Guinness, the 18th-century inventor of the beer that still bears his name.

14. Her father is Jonathan Guinness, 3rd Baron Moyne, the eldest son of Diana Mitford Mosley and Bryan Guinness.

15. Daphne's mother, Jonathan's second wife, was Suzanne Lisney, of Cadaques, Spain, and Paris.

16. Her mother Lisney was an artist and muse to Man Ray and Dalí.

17. As a child, the young Hon. Daphne Guinness grew up in the country houses owned by her family in England and Ireland.

18. She spent her holidays in an 18th-century former monastery in Cadaques, on the Spanish coast near Barcelona, where the neighbors included Salvador Dalí, Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp, Dieter Roth, and Richard Hamilton.

19. She has walked in two of Naomi Campbell's Fashion for Relief shows with the purpose of raising funds for disaster victims.

20. She auctioned off a part of her wardrobe, with the entire proceeds going to a struggling British charity called Womankind Worldwide, which deals with women's issues at home and abroad, such as domestic violence.

21. In June 2010, Guinness purchased the entire lot of the wardrobe of Isabella Blow, her friend who committed suicide in 2007.

22. Guinness also held an auction in 2012 where she raised $744,285 for the Isabella Blow Foundation.

23. Daphne Guinness has worked in a variety of roles: artist, actress, muse, model, collector and designer.

24. Steven Klein, the renowned photographer of such celebrities as Madonna and Lady Gaga, chose Guinness for two Vogue Italia covers.

25. David LaChapelle is her longtime friend and collaborator, and chose her to appear in his Maybach advertising campaign in two intricate pictures for the car's Zeppelin model.

26. On another occasion, when working for LaChapelle, she spent six hours in a tank of water, immersed for up to two minutes at a time, to produce two underwater images, including the famous "Daphne Guinness in Water".

27. In 2011 Guinness was photographed by photographer Bryan Adams and featured on the cover of Zoo Magazine.

28. Daphne Guinness has produced and edited three short films: Cashback, The Phenomenology of Body, and Mnemosyne.

29. Cashback, short film nominated for an Academy Award in 2004, was later made into a feature-length version. Guinness produced this film for the photographer Sean Ellis.

30. "The Phenomenology of Body" was a hymn to the evolution of the female wardrobe over millennia.

31. In 2011, Guinness starred in Joe Lally's film, "The Murder of Jean Seberg".

32. In December 2011, she was photographed, while recorded livestream, by Nick Knight of SHOWstudio.com for 36 hours, resulting in five short films which were played in the windows of the Parisian department store, Le Printemps. In several of these films, Guinness, a soprano, sang opera arias, making her public musical debut.

33. At the end of 2011, photographers Markus Klinko and Indrani, Daphne Guinness, and stylist GK Reid produced "The Legend of Lady White Snake", a film based on an ancient Chinese legend, wherein Daphne played the complex central role of Lady White Snake.

34. In 2013, Guinness released a music video entitled Fatal Flaw which was directed by Nick Knight.

35. In 2014, Guinness released a music video for the song "Evening In Space" the lead single of her debut. The video was directed by David LaChapelle.

36. In 2014, Guinness allowed cameras into her Irish home to record an online documentary by David Barron called Daphne Guinness, The Last Leveller that focuses on her musical endeavours and personal musical tastes.

37. In 1985, when she moved to New York City, she "inherited" many of her sister Catherine's friends. In this way, Guinness came to know Andy Warhol, for whom her sister had been a personal assistant for many years.

38. In 1987, she married Spyros Niarchos, the second son of Stavros Niarchos, the shipping magnate.

39. Guinness and Niarchos have three children.

40. She lives in London and Manhattan with her three children: Nicolas Stavros Niarchos, Lex Spyros Niarchos, and Ines Sophia Niarchos.

41. She has been romantically involved with French TV philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy for a number of years.

42. She has completed her first collection of songs 'Optimist in black.'