Margo Grant Walsh is a 1987 Interior Design Magazine Hall of Fame Inductee and connoisseur of Silver serving pieces, mostly English and American. She graduated from the University of Oregon Summa Cum Laude honors with a Bachelor of Interior architecture in 1960. She followed her education with 13 years at design firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in San Francisco. At the time the world's largest architecture firm, Grant Walsh quickly rose through the ranks at SOM, and became the highest-ranking executive in the firm's burgeoning interiors business. She later took a position with Gensler and Associates in 1973, eventually becoming one of its vice presidents. Since retirement in 2004, Walsh has spent her time curating her vast silver collection.
Video Margo Grant Walsh
Personal life
Marjolaine (Margo) Grant Walsh was born in 1936 to late Alfred and Ann Grant, on Blackfeet Indian Reservation in Fort Peck, Montana. Shortly after her birth, the Grants moved home to Belcourt, North Dakota, a Chippewa Indian reservation near the Canadian border where Grant spent her childhood. After the start of World War Two, the Grant family moved to the Portland, Oregon area, to assist in the war effort at the Kaiser Shipyards. Grant resided in Portland until beginning her college career at the University of Oregon, in Eugene, OR. On 20 February 1994, Margo Grant married John Perry Walsh, becoming Margo Grant Walsh, at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan, NY. Mr. Walsh - a class of 1950 Yale graduate with an MBA from New York University - was a private investor and former president of Florence Walsh Fashions Inc., his late mothers company. Mr. Walsh lost his battle with cancer on 5 September 1998.
Maps Margo Grant Walsh
Education
Margo Grant graduated the University of Oregon Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science in 1959 and a Bachelor of Interior Architecture in 1960.
Professional career
Skidmore, Owings and Merrill
Post-graduation, Walsh spent thirteen years at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in San Francisco, climbing though the ranks and garnering the title of associate/director of interior design. Initially the firm's partners were hesitant to go after interiors projects, and only sought to do projects in buildings also designed by the firm. Walsh Grant eventually convinced them to aggressively market their interiors studio.
Gensler and associates
In 1973 Walsh took a position at Gensler and Associates. When she first spoke with Art Gensler, the firm, which eventually became the largest interiors firm in the world, only had three employees. She became Director of Interior Design in their Houston office with a staff of 35-in 1979 she opened Gensler's New York City offices - where she was promoted to founder and managing principal of the eastern region division. Later, she opened offices in Washington D.C. and Boston, before taking Gensler global to London in 1988. Before leaving Gensler in 2004, Ms. Walsh became one of four on the board of directors, and left the company with a staff of nearly 2,000.
Projects
- Marine Midland Bank Building was completed in 1967 marking one of her earliest projects at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.
- Walsh's most notable project of her early career at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill was the 1969 construction of the Bank of America (555 California St.) world headquarters in San Francisco, where she was appointed head of interior designers.
- While in Huston, TX with Gensler and Associates Walsh designed the interior of Pennzoil Place- one of Huston's most notable Postmodern buildings.
Retirement
Since her retirement from Gensler in 2004, Walsh has focused her time on her immense silver collection that started in 1981. Known as one of the largest in the world, clocking in at just over 800 pieces. Walsh's "Collecting by Design" exhibition displayed over 450 pieces in 40 showcases and has been featured in 11 museum exhibitions since 2002, spanning from New York to San Francisco.
Awards
- In 1987 Margo Grant Walsh was inducted into the Interior Design Hall of Fame.
- The University of Oregon honored Walsh in 2001 when the School of Architecture and Allied Arts announced the establishment of the Margo Grant Walsh Professorship in Interior Architecture.
- In 2002 the University of Oregon awarded Margo Grant Walsh the Ellis F. Lawrence Medal - the highest honor of the School of Architecture and Allied Arts.
References
Bibliography
- Abercrombie, Stanley. "What They're Reading.." Interior Design 76, no. 10 (August 2005): 201. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed 29 September 2016).
- Gans, Jennifer Cross. "Collecting By Design: Silver & Metalwork of the Twentieth Century From the Margo Grant Walsh Collection." Metalsmith 28, no. 2 (June 2008): 48. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed 29 September 2016).
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