She was tall and wry, and those qualities alone made her a powerful force in New York society, but there was so much more.

I met Pat Buckley, who died Sunday at age 80, five years ago at the acquisitions fund benefit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was my second night on the society beat at The New York Sun.

Because I saw her so seldom after that event and because I also met at that event another grande dame I have seen even less often, Brooke Astor, I have come to think of that night as a transitional moment between the old and the new guard.

When I met them, Buckley and Mrs. Astor were old women to me, about my grandmother’s age. And yet they commanded the room. I soon came to appreciate what a rare commodity they were — with their style, personalities, and admirable longevity in their commitments to particular charities.

When she was chairwoman of the Costume Institute galas at the Metropolitan Museum, Buckley made it a point to circulate, the curator in charge at the Institute, Harold Koda, told me yesterday. And she made the rounds not only at the big-ticket dinner, but also at the dessert and dance for the younger set (such is the popularity of the party that the cheaper ticket no longer exists).

She was known for her raucous, if not raunchy, sense of humor; as a hostess, she showed her sweetness.

“One night I was helping her find her driver,” Mr. Koda said. “At the information kiosk there was a group of fashion students — that’s how long ago this was, that fashion students were at the party — and this young man yelled at her, ‘Pat, I love your legs.’ She walked up to him with this fierce expression, lifted her skirt, and gave him her goody bag.”

In November 2004 I attended her election night party at her Upper East Side home. Among the guests were the designers whose clothes she loved wearing: Oscar de la Renta and Carolina Herrera.

With a broken shoulder, she was in some pain. A Bush victory “would make me feel better,” she said.

She had put out, as was her custom, a fabulous spread. “It’s pickup food,” she told me. “Caviar, lamb chops, paté, and filet.”

“She had the best food always, extraordinary, and always unusual — currys, scallop dishes,” a friend and frequent guest at the Buckleys’ home in Connecticut, Shirley Lord Rosenthal, said. “And Bill would always find a wine to match from the cellar.”

Mrs. Rosenthal and Buckley played gin rummy together in the late afternoon. At around half past 6, they would go to the music room, where Mr. Buckley would play the harpsichord or piano.

Friendships were important to her, perhaps none more so than the one she had with Nan Kempner. “The banter was always really funny. They’d been practicing for years,” Mr. Koda said.

When Kempner died in the fall of 2005, Buckley paved the way for an exhibition at the Costume Institute devoted to her wardrobe. She and Deeda Blair took Mr. Koda to lunch in the museum trustees’ dining room. “They were pretty brutal with me,” Mr. Koda said. “They said you’d be a fool not to do it.”

Mrs. Buckley outlined the concept for the show: to have it all together for people to see the way Kempner curated her wardrobe.

Buckley accompanied Mr. Koda on visits to Kempner’s apartment, sitting on the couch while he reviewed racks and racks of couture. “She’d say, ‘That was what she wore to the Central Park Conservancy lunch,’ or the library dinner — she remembered a good number of things, especially evening wear,” Mr. Koda said.

Mr. Koda talked with Buckley about doing an exhibition of her clothes. She refused, explaining that her important pieces, including the Jacques Fath gown in which she was married, had been destroyed in a fire at her home.

And so the clothes, like the person, will have to survive in memories.

agordon@nysun.com