About the book: 2017 / The life of a noblewoman in the secular society of the 19th century began with her first ball. In her complex tulle dress with a pink cover, she entered the ball so freely and simply, as if all these rosettes, lace, all the details of the toilet did not cost her and her family a single minute of attention, as if she had been born in this tulle, lace, with this high hairstyle, with a rose and two leaves at the top. The first ball for a noblewoman marked the beginning of adult life. Receptions and balls, summer evenings in noble estates and winter receptions in luxurious mansions, the search for grooms, engagements and careful preparations for the wedding... The heroines of the book will tell about all this: outstanding women of St. Petersburg secular society, hostesses of literary salons, ladies-in-waiting, wives and lovers of the powerful this.