Investigating the aesthetics of the zenana - the female quarters of the Indic home or palace - this study discusses the history of architecture, fashion, jewellery and cuisine in princely Indian states during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Chapter 1 Introduction: Cosmopolitan Collectors; Chapter 1a The Dholpur Jewellery Dispute, c. 1913: State Jewels, Stridhana and Zenana Patrons; Chapter 2 Trans-Regional Chefs, Kitchens and Cookbooks: Food in the Colonial and Postcolonial Zenana; Chapter 3 The Tawa'if and the Maharani: The Influence of Royal Aesthetics on Indian Cinema, Tourism and Popular Culture; Chapter 4 The Pardah Princess: Orientalist Portraits of the Zenana in Merchant Ivory's Films; Chapter 5 Epilogue;