New England Hall of Fame

This year I was honored to be among the inductees into New England Home Magazine’s Design Hall of Fame.  Here’s what they had to say:

“Many of the inductees into our eight annual New England Design Hall of Fame took a circuitous route to the design industry, first sampling fashion, medicine, social work, and other careers before finding their true calling in architecture and interior design. The defining thread linking them all is talent, and we are thrilled to announce that Douglas Dick, Treffle LaFlech, Christina Oliver, Dinyar Wadia, Jim Gauthier, Susan Stacy, and Rosemary Porto will be be joining the gifted ranks of architects, interior designers, landscape architects, and specialty designers who came before them.

Although she was born into a family of architects, designers and draftsmen, Christina Oliver did not discover a passion for interior design until after a sixteen-tar career as a social worker. While Oliver was contemplating a higher degree in the mental health field, a Myers-Briggs test revealed a keen sense of space she hand’t previously given much thought to. Once she did, she never looked back.

She earned her certificate in interior design from Boston Architectural College in 1990, and opened Oliver Interiors in 1991. It turns out that social work isn’t so far removed from interior design: Oliver’s skill for listening to what clients really want and then translating that into personal spaces factors heavily in her success. Giving back to the community remains a strong tenet of her work ethic; she places an emphasis on hiring interns, and often works for nonprofits such as Rosie’s Place and the Devon Nicole House at Children’s Hospital Boston.

“With all the help and mentoring that I received during the time I was trying to develop my own career, I felt that I needed to give back,” says Oliver. I work with a lot of people who have a lot of resources, and it’s important to me me to do work for people who don’t have those same resources.”

As past president of ASID New England and current president of the Massachusetts Interior Design Coalition, Oliver has been dedicated to pushing through legislation allowing interior designers to bid on state projects separately from architects and engineers. After years of hard work by Oliver and other designers (including fellow New England Design Hall of Fame inductee Lisa Bonneville and Mount Ida College professor Rose Botti-Salitsky), the bill has finally been signed.

Thanks to the dedication of Oliver and others, interior designers can bid on state projects beginning November 19, 2014.”

Christina here: I’m honored to be among such a wonderful and talented group of inductees this year. My thanks to New England Home Magazine and the 2014 Hall of Fame Selection Committee!

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