Polly Jessup (Grande Dame of Palm Beach Decorators)

"Her extravagant insistence on quality and quality only has not been equaled."—Billy Baldwin, An Autobiography

The “Grande Dame of Palm Beach Decorators” comes to life in this new book about renowned interior designer Polly Jessup (1899 – 1988).

Pauline Daniel "Polly" Jessup is known for her graceful and sophisticated interior décor for society’s biggest names—du Pont, Ford, Whitney, Mellon, Reed, and countless other socialites. During her prolific six-decade career Jessup, given her nickname in a 1987 New York Times editorial, oversaw many significant commissions, and her work persevered through the economic downtowns of the Great Depression and well after the post war boom. This new volume weaves social history and a fascinating cast of characters into the fabric of her story, using images of her work and recollections from clients and colleagues to document, for the first time, Jessup’s history and contributions to the design canon.

Author and curatorial historian Maggie Lidz, formerly a research consultant to the Edsel & Eleanor Ford House in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, where she first learned of Jessup, Inc., has written the volume’s three principal chapters, which look variously at the life and career of Polly Jessup, Jessup’s notable clients and their “Jessup Rooms”, and key employees of her company, Jessup Inc. Each of these chapters is heavily illustrated with a wealth of color shots of surviving interiors, archival photographs, and ephemera from the collections at the Preservation Foundation of Palm Beach, The Society of the Four Arts, The Edsel and Ethel Ford House, and the Detroit Institute of Arts.