Bucking the tradition of more than four decades, Lynn Wyatt opted not to spend her birthday in the South of France this July rather to celebrate with a passel of Houston friends vacationing on the sunny isle of Nantucket.

"This is a big birthday for me," she said on her return to Houston, "and I am going to celebrate all year long so why not go and celebrate somebody else's birthday because I'm going to celebrate mine all year."

Lynn is not keeping it a secret that she turned 75 on Friday. (More than a few women, much younger, are slitting their wrists in envy of the glamorous, intelligent and much-admired social diva — and we mean that in the best possible way.)

Her birthday is the same day as that of friend Franci Crane, who had orchestrated a weekend round of festivities for her 60th. It was a 21st century redux of Franci's 50th, also celebrated in Nantucket where Franci and Jim Crane have a summer home. And who could resist the invitation from Crane to party New England style? Obviously, not Lynn, at least not this summer.

Lynn celebrated her special day with friends Cece and Mack Fowler, with whom she house-guested over the weekend, at a luncheon at the Great Harbor Yacht Club. The Houston crowd helping Wyatt blow out the candles included Susie and Sanford Criner, Vance Muse and Carl Palazzolo, Kathryn and Jim Ketelsen, Jay Baker, Marion Barthelme and Jeff Fort, and Karen and Harry Pinson plus Elisabeth Biondi of The New Yorker.

It was just the beginning of celebrating La Wyatt. The August issue of Harper's Bazaar features an interview with Lynn on her friendship with the late Princess Grace of Monaco. Author William Middleton, calling Houston home for several years now as he works on a biography of Dominique de Menil, wrote the piece that reveals Lynn's interesting take on Princess Grace's sense of style.

In the article, Wyatt reveals that she met Grace in the 1960s at a lunch in San Antonio. They became such good friends that the Wyatts moved their summer home from Saint-Tropez to Cap Ferrat, to be closer to the palace, at Grace's suggestion.

Wyatt told Middleton that she also discovered Grace’s practical solution to humidity: a turban, sometimes worn under a hat. It became her trademark. For formal evenings, however, Grace summoned legendary hairstylist Alexandre from Paris, often sharing his services with Wyatt. After a gala affair, “We would sit in the garden and talk until four in the morning,” Wyatt recalled. “We’d have scrambled eggs and dish!”

To top off the birthday week, KTRK Channel 13 aired a Melanie Lawson interview with Lynn on Monday night.

Here's what she had to say: