Her father, Joachim, Count of Schönburg-Glauchau, was the nominal head of the Glauchau branch of the German princely House of Schönburg, a mediatised dynasty within the former Holy Roman Empire.

She has two brothers, Carl-Alban Count von Schönburg-Glauchau (born 1966), formerly head of the family, who renounced his rights after his marriage to Juliet Helene Beechy-Fowler, daughter of Nicholas Beechy-Fowler and Countess Jutta von Pfeil und Klein-Ellguth; and Alexander, Count of Schönburg-Glauchau, a writer and the nominal head of the Schönburg-Glauchau branch of the family, who is married according to the rules of the house to Princess Irina of Hesse, grandniece of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, consort of Queen Elizabeth II.

[5] In 1945 the Soviet government of Saxony seized her family's ancestral homes, castles Wechselburg, Hinterglauchau, Forderglauchau, Rochsburg, Alt-Penig, and Neu-Penig.

She moved back to Germany with her family in 1970 and enrolled at the Konrad-Adenauer-Gymnasium in Meckenheim, later studying at Kloster Wald, a girls' boarding school in a Benedictine convent.

[3][4] After her sister, Maya, was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2012, Gloria accompanied her on pilgrimages to Lourdes and Santiago de Compostela Cathedral in Spain.

[19] Bannon suggested her palatial home, Schloss Thurn und Taxis, as a potential site for a school to educate and train right-wing Catholics, but no firm plans have been made.

These comments met with widespread criticism, and she expressed similar views in 2008, attributing sexual behavior in Africa to the continent's hot climate.

These political alliances sparked controversy, leading to the cancellation of an exhibition of her work at El Museo del Barrio's 50th anniversary gala in Manhattan in 2019.

In 2024, she delivered a speech at the National Conservatism Conference in Brussels, where she advocated for traditional Catholic values and criticized the religious stance of Pope Francis.