The Florida Times Union
A beautiful balance: To Maria Pollard, good design is all about harmony
By Barbara Gavan
Maria Crosby Pollard is coming home this week. A native of Jacksonville, who now lives and works in Alexandria, Va., Pollard will be a guest lecturer next week at the 2017 Art &Antiques Show to benefit Wolfson Children's Hospital.
"It will be fun to be back in Jacksonville," she said. "I miss the river and all the trees. I lived in Ortega until I was about 15 when my entire family - including grandparents, aunts, uncles - migrated to Ponte Vedra Beach. I left Jacksonville after I graduated from Bolles and went to [University of] Georgia."
After graduation, Pollard said she "went straight to New York," where she lived for 10 years, working with some of the better-known interior design firms in the country: Cullman &Kravis, David Easton, Charlotte Moss and Katie Ridder.
Pollard settled into life in New York, bought an apartment and began to renovate it, when life sent her a little farther down the road.
"My friends and I were going to a large black-tie party and needed a place to gather beforehand," she said. "I offered my place, since it was well-situated for the party, and everyone came over. In the group was the man who would become my husband. As fate would have it, he had accepted a position in Washington D.C. that morning."
"I believe in tailoring my projects to reflect the personalities and tastes of the clients," she said. "It begins with our initial conversation; I ask what is important to them, what elements are essential, what images they love. Then, I try to capture their vision, to translate those ideas to their homes with a twist and a creative sense of cohesiveness. That's the excitement and the challenge of each project."
To Pollard, color is perhaps the most important element of a design.
"If I'm known for anything in particular, I usually hear that it is 'use of color,'" she said. "My background is in drawing and painting - that's what I studied in college, and I work from that perspective. Color is about composition; it's what makes a room come together. I gravitate toward color, but the intensity depends on the client. It's all about balance and getting the right hue, so it's not jarring to the eye."
With a husband, three small children and a puppy, Pollard also understands the principles of designing for homes with youngsters.
"I believe that children and beautiful interiors are not mutually exclusive; we use fine things in ways that don't limit our clients' fun," she said. "On one hand, don't be afraid of having nice things, even if you have young children. On the other hand, don't set yourself up for disaster with a lot of frills and delicate art pieces within reach of little hands. But, children are quite capable of learning not to touch certain things, and that not everything is for them or about them. A home is to live in; it's not a museum, so balance is important there, too."