By the mid-1930s the musical salon was an anachronism. The younger generation of “chic” Parisians had little interest in the musicales hosted by this duchess or that countess. The space formerly reserved in newspapers for the private gatherings of the gratin was now filled with photographs of socialites in Chanel gowns and Schiaparelli hats, of princes perched in their Renault sports cars or twin-engine airplanes, and of movie stars (mostly American) in full-page photomontages. Thanks to her Dupuy connections, Winnaretta's salon gatherings still received occasional coverage in Le Figaro, Excelsior, and The New York Herald. But the reportage took place in a climate of shifting political winds, one that would culminate the following year in the election of Léon Blum and a government dominated by the Popular Front, a coalition Leftist party. At this moment when the working class was on the ascent, the idle aristocracy and its leisure pursuits—of which the salon was an icon—were objects of derision. Winnaretta's musical activities were lampooned for their elitism by the unfriendly factions of the press. One such article appeared in Vendémiaire, signed by a reporter called “Snob.”

Winnaretta was not necessarily better served by her advocates in the press. In late 1934 a full-page article by Jean Desbordes appeared in Paris- Midi under the expansive headline, “Great Ladies of Paris: The Princesse E. de Polignac, or the Genius of the Arts.”