Education

Harvard University

A.B. in Romance Languages and Literatures, 1984; Magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa. Semester at Sorbonne, full scholarship

Awards

For 2019 biography of Mary Rogers Williams:

Award of Merit, Connecticut League of History Organizations; Connecticut Center for the Book, Finalist, Spirit of Connecticut Award; Sarton Women’s Book Award

Society of American Archivists, J. Franklin Jameson Archival Advocacy Award, 2012

National Endowment for the Arts, Design Arts Grant, 1988, for Hallowed Ground: Lost Cemeteries of Queens, exhibit about tiny family-owned graveyards at Municipal Art Society, Queens Historical Society

Book

Forever Seeing New Beauties: The Forgotten Impressionist Mary Rogers Williams, 1857-1907, Wesleyan University Press, 2019. Winner, Sarton Women’s Book Award, prizes from Connecticut Center for the Book and Connecticut League of History Organizations. Reviewed positively in publications including Vogue.

Miscellany

Board Memberships

Grolier Club (council member, Special Functions), Art Glass Forum | New York (president, 2019-21), Victorian Society New York (vice-president), Poster House (advisor), Historic Districts Council (advisor), Lotus Garden (co-president), Friends of the Erben Organ (advisor), CUNY’s Women Writing Women’s Lives (steering committee)

Editor/Essayist/Exhibition Advisor

2018: “The Women Makers,” Modern Americana (Rizzoli); “Zsolnay, Galileo Chini, Rick Owens,” 30 for 30 (Jason Jacques Gallery); 2016: Foreword, Robert Winthrop Chanler: Discovering the Fantastic (Monacelli Press); 2014: “‘Forever Seeing New Beauties’: The Art of Mary Rogers Williams, 1857-1907,” Florence Griswold Museum, Old Lyme, Conn.; 2009: Exhibit texts, Zsolnay Art Pottery (Forbes Galleries), How They Lived: Photos of Hungarian Jewish Life (92nd Street Y); 2007: I.D. magazine, ornament theme issue (Folio 2007 gold medal, editorial excellence, B2B design magazines); 2006: Zsolnay Art Pottery: The Gyugyi Collection; 2002: Chrysler Design Awards; 2001: Graphic Design History, Budapest 1900-2000, Parliament House of Hungary; 1997: Budapest Then and Now

Juror

I.D. Annual Design Review (2004–09), ICA&CA/Arthur Ross Awards (2004), Alliance for Downtown N.Y. (1996), justice-theme garden in L.A. (1995), Harvard Graduate School of Design studio (1994), American Institute of Architects (AIA)/CT awards (1993)

Symposium Panelist/Lecturer

Preservation Society of Newport County, University Club, Landmark West!, College Art Association (2021-22): “Hettie Anderson (1873-1938), Artists’ Model and Enigma”; 2019-22: lectures re Mary Rogers Williams book at venues including Metropolitan Museum of Art; Poster House (2018): “Nazi Poster Thieves”; Harmony Hall (2018): “Edith Varian Cockcroft Rediscovered”; Brooklyn Historical Society (2015): “Collecting Stories of African American Civil War Soldiers”; Historic Northampton, Mass. (2015): “The Mysterious Lathrop Sisters”; Florence Griswold Museum (Old Lyme, Conn.), Brooklyn Historical Society, Smith College (2014): “The Impressionist in the Boathouse: How I Rediscovered the 19th-Century Painter Mary Rogers Williams”; Vizcaya Museum, Miami (2014): “Robert Winthrop Chanler”; School of Visual Arts/Design Criticism: guest lecturer (2011, 2010); ICA&A: “Adventures in Restoration” (2010), “Bronx Zoo Lion House Restoration” (2008), “From the Offices” (2005), “Of Our Time: Changing Attitudes in Historic Preservation” (2004); Portsmouth (N.H.) Music Hall (2008): “Reimagining an American Treasure”; Museum of the City of New York (2007): “The Bungalows of Rockaway”; HDC: “The Bungalows of Rockaway” (2012); “Evolution of Sickness: New York Hospital Architecture” (2006), “Dead in New York: Cemetery Preservation” (2005), “Working with the Press” (2004)

Fluent in French, working knowledge of Spanish and Hungarian