4. Sisi Refused to Let People Take Her Picture
Adored for her beauty and for populist policies that championed the people rather than the monarchy, Sisi became possibly the first celebrity monarch. Still, her personal life was challenging at best, fueled by depression, a domineering mother-in-law, and homesickness for Bavaria and her carefree youth. In a sense, Sisi spent much of her adult life trying to relive or somehow recapture her youth. Her hairdresser had to tweeze out any gray hairs meticulously, and the empress had a beauty regimen that would make today’s most eccentric Hollywood stars’ quirks appear to look normal.
As a celebrity, people frequently tried to catch her when she was outdoors and take pictures of her. However, by the time she was only 32 years old, she refused to allow anyone to take photos of her, possibly because of her fading youth. She loved riding on horseback or going for long walks; when she did, she usually carried a parasol or brought something to cover her face to prevent people from being able to photograph her face. Still, she insisted on wearing a corset to preserve her tiny waist and doing absurd things like sleeping with meat on her face to retain her peaches-and-cream skin color.