Some months after Winnaretta's death, Lennox Berkeley wrote to Nadia Boulanger,

In December 1944, Le Figaro published a commemorative article, expressing regret that, when she had died a year earlier, “the events and the subjugation that weighed on all free expression in France did not permit us to speak as we would have wished.” The article, praising her lifelong contribution to the arts, concluded that “it will be impossible to write the chronicle of the twentieth century without including the salon on Avenue Henri-Martin and the palazzo on the Grand Canal… . Music has forever inscribed her name at the top of some of the classic works of our time.”

A large memorial gathering in Winnaretta's honor was held in Paris sometime in 1944. Many family members, friends, and distinguished members of the European cultural community celebrated the life of this “eightthousand- volt being,” as Armande de Polignac aptly described her aunt. Shortly thereafter Winnaretta's will was read. In addition to the bequests of money and objects that she had made to various family members and friends, the document testified to her commitment to art, artists, and charitable institutions. Generous legacies were left to Colette, Nadia Boulanger, Clara Haskil, Giorgio Levi, Renata Borgatti, Jacques Février, and Léon- Paul Fargue (Fargue's bequest was the last codicil to be added to the will, in 1939). Institutions such as the Hospice for the Women of Calvary, the Society for the Preservation and Rehabilitation of Young Girls, and the Pasteur Institute (to which she endowed two scholarships) were also beneficiaries of her posthumous largesse. She donated the wainscotting from her library to the Musée des Arts Décoratifs; to the Louvre she left her beloved Manet canvas, La Lecture, as well as the Ingres drawing, the two large Paninis, and the three Monets—including the Champs de tulipes en Hollande that had brought her into competition with Edmond for its purchase.