Gunilla Von Bismarck: Queen of the Marbella jet-set

Marbella has long had a reputation for being the playground of the rich and famous, attracting royalty, movie stars and socialites from all corners of the world. Among the many celebrities who chose this exclusive location as their adopted home is Gunilla von Bismarck, the German heiress who became known as the "queen without a throne of Marbella".

The image of the Marbella jet-set scene during the 1970s, 80s and 90s, the countess made her mark on the Costa del Sol town by hosting the most exclusive parties that were attended by some of the richest celebrities in the world.

Her high-profile presence on the extravagant social scene during the golden era promoted Marbella around the globe and it is for this reason that the town hall decided to name a road in her honour - Diseminado von Bismarck.

The heiress to a great fortune, accompanied by her five siblings and her parents, arrived on the Costa del Sol in 1961, when she was just 12 years old, and it was not long before she began to enjoy the glamorous social scene that Marbella offered at that time. She was certainly no stranger to a life of luxury. The great-granddaughter of chancellor Otto von Bismarck, from whom she derives her fortune, she was born in Friedrichsruh castle in West Germany in 1949.

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She was once an essential character at the most exclusive parties and was featured on the covers of glossy magazines and newspapers, along with her husband, Luis Ortiz, a native of Madrid whom she married in the castle where she was born in 1978. Although the couple, whose son Francisco was born two years later in Malaga, divorced in 1989, they continued to live together and always appeared together in public, until Ortiz died in September 2024.

Today, the countess lives between Spain, Switzerland and Germany, although her days of endless parties are now a thing of the past.